Casino Royale The good news is that Daniel Craig (have you seen Layer Cake ?) makes a great James Bond. This is a rougher, leaner, and meaner Bond than we have seen in the past. The opening action sequence is a rollercoaster ride, and you could justify going to see this movie on this alone. The movie also has a title sequence that calls out to be seen on the big screen. The impact is not the same if you wait to see this on that 13 inch TV in the kitchen. There are so many small and intricate moving parts in the title sequence that you can not catch it all on the first go around. I loved this title sequence. Clever title sequences have the ability to make me very happy. I think the last time a title sequence made me get out of the seat like this one did was when I went and saw Se7en .
I may be alone on this, but what really caught my eye is how well this movie uses the wide screen. The composition of the shots makes excellent use of the whole screen, something that is not often done. The cinematographer was Phil Meheux. The movie was directed by Martin Campbell, who also directed the earlier James Bond entry, GoldenEye . This entry starts from the beginning and has James Bond becoming 007.
After a socko whamo beginning, the movie slows down a bit. There is love affair in the middle that has a forced kind of feel to it. But the script throws you a couple of monkey wrenches that will keep you interested. And the action sequences do not let you down. I think the major fault of the movie is that it spends way too much time showing us Bond play poker. We don't want to watch Bond play poker. We want to watch him in fights, being cool, kissing girls and making them cry, and blowing up things with huge fireball explosions. Do yourself a favor and go see this while it is still in the theater.
You can write James Harper at movielover77061@yahoo.com |
