Sexy Script Girl, sensational soundtrack

Watching this latest report from the smart and sexy Script Girl -- and marveling at the cheeky way she employs Herb Alpert's sprightly rendition of the title song from the original Casino Royale (1967) -- made me remember how much I used to enjoy playing the soundtrack LP for that wildly uneven James Bond spoof. I had no idea back in the '60s (and '70s) just how technically remarkable that platter really was. Now I wish I had held on to my copy -- it might fetch a nice price on eBay.

Post No. 200: Kim loves Godzilla (and Clint and Whitney)

For the 200th posting on this blog, I take -- well, pride probably isn't the right word in this context. Amusement, maybe? In any event: Kim Jong Il may not be able to get new films from Netflix after all if President Bush has his way. And that's a pity, because, as the Associated Press reports, Kim "is said to own an extensive movie library of more than 10,000 titles and prefers films about James Bond and Godzilla, along with Clint Eastwood's 1993 drama, In the Line of Fire, and Whitney Houston's 1992 love story, The Bodyguard." Maybe somebody will slip him a DVD of Casino Royale in return for a promise not to build nukes? (That is, unless Kim soured on 007 after seeing Die Another Day.) Or perhaps all great dictators really prefer Mickey Mouse?

Correction: Birds beat Bond (but just barely)

The final b.o. figures won't be reported until Monday, but preliminary estimates suggest that Happy Feet, not Casino Royale, will claim bragging rights for the No. 1 spot this weekend.

But never mind: The Batman Begins of the 007 franchise smashingly succeeds at establishing a new star (buff and brutal Daniel Craig) as the legendary Brit secret agent, even while offering a darker, edgier and -- dare I say it? -- slightly more realistic take on superspy derring-do. (Ian Fleming very likely would have approved.)

With a minimum of high-tech gadgetry and a maximum of hand-to-hand, fist-to-face, club-to-balls rough stuff, Casino Royale is hugely satisfying and impressively exciting, beginning with an ice-cold black-and-white sequence that has James Bond earning his license to kill, careening through some sensational action set pieces (including a spectacular confrontation on an airport runway, and an ingeniously sustained foot chase throughout Madagascar), lingering on some smoothly (and cleverly) suspenseful card games at the title locale -- poker, not baccarat, is 007's game of choice here -- and climaxing with a thrilling image of Bondian iconography.


My only real complaint is directed at the saggy pacing in the last half-hour or so: There's too much time spent on an obviously doomed romance between Bond and fetching femme fatale Vesper Lynd (Eva Green) after the chief bad guy is dispatched. (So much time, in fact, that even the dimmest bulb in the audience will have long enough to realize that, hey, Something Else is bound to happen before the closing credits.) Otherwise, a great reboot for the series, a welcome treat for long-time fans, and a terrific introduction for newcomers to the 007 mythos.

Bond beats birds

But the weekend b.o. battle has only just begun, Nikki Finke warns.

What's that? You say there's a new James Bond movie coming out this weekend? Really? Gee, why haven't we heard more about it?

But seriously, folks: New York Daily News profiles the "Bond girl" who's clearly uncomfortable with that dubious title, and the on-set photographer who's hugely impressed by the new 007. And long-time Bondophile Louis B. Parks offers a nifty overview of the superspy franchise and an amusing sidebar about Bond's introduction to American audiences (and readers) in the Houston Chronicle.

The once and future Bonds

Interesting featurette in the Sunday L.A. Times about the "rebooting" of the James Bond franchise (following the financially successful but critically drubbed Die Another Day) with Casino Royale. Helmer Martin Campbell -- who previously jump-started the series by introducing Pierce Brosnan as 007 in GoldenEye -- admits he wasn't entirely convinced at first that Daniel Craig could take over the superspy role. But that was before he realized the producers wanted to return to the gritty roots of the original Ian Fleming novel. Money quote: "[O]nce I saw where we were going, Daniel was the perfect fit for the story we were telling. The character in the books is much darker than he has been in the movies and that's what we've returned to. It's a more personal, more emotional story than we've seen Bond in before. Daniel has a sexuality that's very much in keeping with how Fleming saw the character."

I realize this is a minority opinion, but I've always felt that, up until now, Timothy Dalton came closer than any other actor to playing 007 as the ruthless SOB that Fleming originally envisioned. Unfortunately, his two Bond movies -- Licence to Kill and The Living Daylights -- were box-office underachievers. For the sake of the series and its longtime fans (and yes, I include myself in their number), I hope Casino Royale makes a bigger splash and comes up a winner.

On the other hand: I can remember a time when Pierce Brosnan was hyped as the new and improved 007...