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Why did Casini Royale represent the peak rather than the start of the Craig era?

posted 8 years ago by coolslowhand
29 replies | jump to latest

Much too much was always made about the man playing James Bond. I believe (like many) that Connery was the iconic Bond. Only he was able to combine suave, good looks, and rugged masculinity with a boyish charm. That is a very difficult thing to do - Clark Gable?s former wife said that the combination of unquestioned masculinity with a little boy was what made Gable such an icon.

However, every single man who played Bond made better Bond films than DaF and NSNA. Roger Moore is lambasted by many for his portrayal of Bond, but many think TSWLM is the best of the entire franchise. Lazenby was an amateur actor and looked more like a scared boy than an iconic spy, but many consider his sole effort the best movie in the entire franchise as well. In short, one actor does not a Bond movie make or ruin???

So, when Daniel Craig signed on to play Bond I was intrigued ? he wouldn?t have the good looks, screen presence, or boyish charm of Connery, but he might be able to play a more complicated and exciting Bond for the modern times. As soon as Casino Royale was released everyone fixated on Craig, saying he was instantly at least the 2nd best and perhaps the best Bond of all. Looking back ? Casino Royale was a VERY good story. It was also the first Bond ever written by Fleming and had a lot of magic to it. One of the best in the entire canon of Bond. Bond was more human (like in OHMSS) but also very edgy. The movie itself had less gadgets, less clowning around, one-liners, etc. It was just what was needed after Brosnan?s tenure (which had a steep decline after Golden Eye)

After that, however, they have been searching for an identity. Part of this has been tone ? Most appreciate the fact we are seeing more realism and less camp. But starting with QoS this era has been a disappointment for many fans, as Bond lost much of the fun many fans search for. James Bond has never been Bruce Wayne, after all??.

The bigger issue, however, is that the writing has not been very good. QoS should have been written for Charles Bronson because it would be better than the later entries but not as good as the first of the Deathwish movie. Skyfall makes M extremely unsympathetic, has her rely on Bond to protect her, and then he allows her to be killed. So many better ways to bring in a new M (such as having her dying not be due to his failure. After all, it?s sort of hard to be the best 00 agent when you let your boss get killed?..) Finally, the latest entry decided to turn a long-time rivalry between Bond and his most hated rival villain (the one who killed his wife and appeared in several movies, after all??.) into something based on??sibling rivalry. Like something from a soap opera or a cartoon.

Looking back now 10 year later, when Casino Royale was more about the last great Fleming novel being turned into a movie then the start of a great new era. The four Craig films as a whole are better than the four Brosnan films as a whole (although golden eye is better than at least 2 of the Craig films) and the short-live Dalton era, but it did not turn out to be the promising group of films we all believed

Why do you thinks this was? Not as inspired stories?

[–] 8 years ago

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[–] coolslowhand 8 years ago

I enjoyed your post. That’s a very good point about the first 4 films. By the time you get to Thunderball you go from masterpieces to a film that has parts of it which have the magic and greatness, but is much too flabby and indulgent. I think you are spot-on with the evolution of the series.

It’s also interesting to note that Connery and Moore not only had long runs but actually grew and improved in the role before becoming played out. On the other hand, the Brosnan, Craig, and Dalton eras came out with their best stuff and never took another step up.
QOS attempted something no other Bond movie had ever attempted – to continue an old story. Even after Bond’s wife is murdered in OHMSS it’s not really carried over to the next movie (yeah, he “kills” at the beginning, but we don’t know why, because it’s a different actor playing both men….

I hate to compare Bond to a comic book character, but I think a little bit of Batman’s history. Batman is the drawing card of that franchise. Sometimes, however, movies, comics, etc. have involved too much of the “bat family” and given them so much screen time or book time that Batman ends up weaker as a result. At the end of the day, Batman is the strongest character they have, after all… I see a similar thing with Bond

Looking at the original “M” it was a fun relationship with Bond – he was sort of an annoyed father figure with the son who was so talented but sometimes a little irresponsible… He showed up once or twice per film and it was enjoyable. Same thing with Q and Moneypenny. The writers knew their role and kept them at that. No one really cares about them that much - they are plot devices and nostalgia, not suddenly co-stars....

What do you think will be the next direction the franchise takes?

[–] 8 years ago

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[–] Drooch (5333) 4 years ago

The best way to take the franchise after Craig would be to make a period Bond, probably set in the 60’s, shot in the classic technicolour style but with modern day action scenes, a bit like the recent Man From UNCLE remake.

Most importantly, it needs to be 100% anti-woke and relish the sexism and other outdated attitudes, it needn’t condone them but they should be present. It should also be unashamedly patriotic. If they did this then Bond would become a really important cultural icon again.

[–] ClementinaSpur (1328) 2 months ago

The best way to take the franchise after Craig would be to make a period Bond, probably set in the 60’s, shot in the classic technicolour style but with modern day action scenes, a bit like the recent Man From UNCLE remake.

Most importantly, it needs to be 100% anti-woke and relish the sexism and other outdated attitudes, it needn’t condone them but they should be present. It should also be unashamedly patriotic. If they did this then Bond would become a really important cultural icon again.

Agree, agree, agree with all of this.

[–] GrematikalHeiror 8 years ago

Way too long didn't bother reading.

Just happened to be the best one is all.

What am I gonna do... with a gun rack?

[–] mariakelly-04164 8 years ago

AndrewMcdonaldGlouster, please show a little respect for the late, great Lois Maxwell, please.

Laugh while you can, Monkey Boy!

[–] mariakelly-04164 8 years ago

Casino Royale was the first James Bond novel, and since it describes his first mission, the producers may have thought it would be a good way to introduce Daniel Craig.

Laugh while you can, Monkey Boy!

[–] ebhaynz (3758) 4 years ago

I think what they do is get you hooked by making a high quality first movie then ride on those coattails for the next 4-5 movies. Lazenby could have at least been in one more Bond movie but I bet it would have followed the same trend.

[–] DracTarashV2 (4497) 4 years ago

Skyfall all the f’n way. Craig detractors, the lot of you, be damned.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1564) 2 months ago

Casino royale was at the tail-end of an era of good movies. They started to suck around the late 2000s.

[–] Ace_Spade (9657) 14 days ago

They still make really, really great movies. Although, they aren't really the big promoted ones. There's a bunch of dull, indiscernible superhero junk, lazy CGI kids' movies, and mediocre streaming movies flopping around eating up a lot of commercial time while invested media giants desperately push them, but if you poke a little, you can find great stuff.

Nosferatu is a feast; the Dune films; Everything, Everywhere, All At Once; Babylon; The Green Knight; Arrival; The Tragedy of Macbeth - and those are just some of the films I've watched and really enjoyed. There are a bunch more I've loved, and still more that I've heard great things about but haven't yet seen.

There are always great movies.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1564) 14 days ago

All those movies you mentioned I found to be intensely mediocre (especially Villeneuve movies). Mostly either dull, too jokey, or too pretentious. I guess nosferatu was okay. Mostly due to the new generation of filmmakers (millennials/gen z) being raised on video games and comic books, instead of having a strong literary or cinematic background like previous generations. Movies today are mostly made by hipster nerds.

I noticed after 2007 that films seemed to have lost their serious element and became glorified Netflix specials, with too much meta-humour. Certainly nothing that comes out today can compare even to movies from the 90s and early 2000s. And cinema has been declining in quality since the 70s,

[–] Ace_Spade (9657) 13 days ago

I think we completely disagree on this. I think there are great films in every era. There are certainly things about different eras that I miss or that I think we did better at that time, but there's still a lot of wonderful cinema out there.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1564) 13 days ago

I don’t think it’s as much disagreement as it is fact. There are objectively not really any iconic films made anymore, at least for Hollywood/western cinema. TBH I think cinema is pretty much dead.

[–] Ace_Spade (9657) 13 days ago

It's not a fact.

I think cinema is in a weird phase right now where it's diffused by streaming and whatnot, but I also firmly believe there are still true artists out there making use of this medium. To say that there aren't is to either inexplicably think that great filmmakers only existed pre-2000s or will require some reasoning as to why artists aren't making art with movies anymore.

Look, I'm not saying you're factually wrong, either. I can see the argument that movies are declining or that the '70s had the best movies - those are arguments that can have a good deal of validity. But it isn't a decided, provable fact.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1564) 13 days ago

No, it is definitely a fact, there are objectively less iconic films.

I don’t really care about your fake strawman argument. Movies now are dogshit and haven’t been relevant for a while

[–] Ace_Spade (9657) 13 days ago

Well, first of all, the quality of movies is partly subjective. I've listed a bunch of films that I love that you don't. That's not *factually* wrong, that's our opinions.

As to "iconic," I'm assuming that you mean big, cultural touchstones? The way Star Wars is iconic? If I'm wrong, please correct me, I'm not trying to argue irrelevant points you aren't making. But, assuming that's what's meant, it would be difficult to argue that Lord of the Rings, The Avengers, The Dark Knight, and yeah, even the Dune movies aren't iconic. Dune didn't hit Star Wars levels of cultural critical mass, but the MCU reshaped the film industry and pushed comic book/superhero everything all over pop culture. I think the MCU got stale - we probably see eye-to-eye there - but it's as iconic as they come.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1564) 13 days ago

Okay Lord of the Rings, yes, Pirates of the Caribbean and Harry Potter. Big iconic franchises, but those were early 2000s movies. Everything else since has mostly been a superhero remake of older franchises. Batman started in 1989. The dark knight was really just the beginning of the soulless reboot phase of Hollywood. It’s not a good film, the screenplay is pretty poor, as is the editing, from an objective standpoint. The MCU was largely responsible for ruining blockbusters as well by turning them into vapid, production line quality movies. I mean we already had the Hulk in 2003. Why did we need a worse one in 2008? Iron Man was pretty lame too. The Avengers is objectively just one big joke of a movie, they’re constantly winking at the audience and plays out more like a comedy than a serious movie. I mean, yeah there were also campy superhero flicks in the 90s like Batman Forever, but those weren’t “cultural touchstones”, they were seen as mildly enjoyable escapist entertainment for children to watch. Which is precisely my point, sometime around 2008/2009 when those first MCU movies and superhero reboots started coming out, Hollywood completely ran out of original ideas… objectively, and just began regurgitating things from the past.

And there is a host of reasons for that, from the expansion of technology and streaming that largely diluted the whole filmmaking process. Originally there was a time when filmmaking and even television was concentrated among a handful of big studios/networks. Now everything is so spread out amongst hundreds or even thousands of subsidiaries, the amount of writers/filmmaking ‘talent’ has been completely saturated. When a fat girl from Ohio with a camcorder becomes the next Mozart, filmmaking is basically dead as an art form. There used to be a sense of professionalism and seriousness to it, now everyone and their dog can make a movie and call it ‘art’. The progression of technology has mostly led to traditional monoculture and classic mythologies dying out.

[–] Ace_Spade (9657) 12 days ago

Yeah, you and I are mostly on the same page when it comes to the MCU generally making blockbuster movies worse. They were 100% iconic, though, and are the latest/last thing that was a singular culture of myth-making. You might not enjoy those myths, but even obscure superheroes like Star Lord (I'm a moderate comic book nerd and even I'd never read Guardians of the Galaxy) are well-known in the general popular consciousness. They are still iconic, regardless of quality.

The claim that cinema has been declining since the '70s I'll still push back on. If you want to say that mainstream cinema or big releases are worse - sure, I'll agree with that. But cinema in-general? No, I can't agree with that. If you want to say that The Godfather is the best film ever, go ahead, that's a great pick. For me, I prefer Seven Samurai and Casablanca. And my point here is that, if cinema is downhill from what a person (subjectively) considers the apex of cinema, then I'd have to take the position that movies haven't been the same since 1954, and I'm not making that claim.

Basically, I feel like there are still a tonne of quality artworks out there in the cinematic medium. TV and streaming have opened up a lot, too, and I've seen some marvellous stuff there (like Blue Eyed Samurai).

But, a new point of discussion is introduced now where you say that tech has led to monoculture dying out. I think I agree here, too. It is unlikely that we will see global, lasting phenomena like The Beatles or Star Wars, or even The Avengers, anymore because there is so much to watch.

And I will also agree that there is a tonne of dreck out there. Youtube and the majority of streaming content is just filler. But that doesn't mean the gold is gone.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1564) 12 days ago

I mean, I guess it depends on the criteria of what defines iconic. Is it truly a watershed cultural touchstone or is it more the effect of clever marketing. For the MCU and GOTG, the groundwork was already established for them. They are literally just adapting the comic book designs for the screen without adding anything new. I can't even hum the theme tune to the Avengers or recall any "iconic" phrases or lines, unlike Harry Potter or LOTR. It's just very commercialized and sterile.

[–] FootOfDavros (8696) 14 days ago

It was a "peak" because it was a one trick pony.

All very well the first time you see it but where can you go after that?

Once you remove all the elements that made James Bond films James Bond films you're just left with a serious tone action flick. And that's it. You can only ever have diminishing returns. That's why they had to go with crap like attempting to copy The Dark Knight, making Blofeld his brother (FFS!) and then ultimately killing him off. Because they had absolutely nothing left to make the product original.

Here's an example - I went to Uni long, long after the 70s had passed. And me and my pals (and I'm sure many more elsewhere around the country / world even) would gather around and watch the old classics, Sir Sean's and the sheer Rogertainment of what followed. Everyone knew what was going to happen but still were happy to watch these films over and over for the comedy one linears, the sexual innuendo, the action set pieces, the latest villain's attempt a world domination, the open sequences, etc... They had meme value long before that had ever become a thing.

I find it impossible to believe that any guys or gals are sitting about in their student halls today and anyone responds enthusiastically to a shout of 'Hey, anyone want to watch Quantum Of Solace with some beers?"

They, incredibly, managed to destroy their own genre...

[–] TandyMan (11343) 14 days ago

Yeah. They kept trying to recreate the trick. Every Craig film was Bond Begins over and over again, without ever getting to be Bond, and then all the sudden he was retired and dead. Without the hook of "this is how Bond becomes the Bond we know and love" they had nothing. As for the OP's post of what made Casino so good, obviously it was having the source material to work from. The minute they had to make up their own crap it was trash. But technically very successful. They made lots of money.

[–] FootOfDavros (8696) 14 days ago

Yeah, that's true.

But it's worth remembering that Die Another Day was also very successful financially. So they killed the franchise off for no real reason.

[–] Melton (5553) 14 days ago

Because Craig was new and hungry, and the film was based on Flemming material.

As time went on Craig became more powerful and had more of a say in the films, so he lazily dialled back the fight scenes and obnoxiously dialled up the woke.

At the same time, they had no more Flemming material to provide a solid foundation, so Barbara Broccoli’s worst creative instincts were unmoored. She allowed Craig to dictate terms, and as a woman leaned into the emotion-relationship-family storylines which are anti-Bond (Blofeld is Bond’s long lost step-brother? Really?)

By No Time To Die Bond was a loser who got dominated by tough women instead of fucking them, and lost and died. Cubby Broccoli is spinning in his grave 🤦🏻‍♂️

[–] Darren (1456) 13 days ago

I find it interesting that the last three actors to play Bond all had really great first films in their respective series, and only mediocre or bad films after that (Die Another Day was terrible.) Of all the Bond actors, Connery had the best run by far; none of his Bond movies were bad, and even the worst were not bad. Lazenby only had the one. Moore's were hit and miss -- his first two were just okay, his third was outstanding, his fourth, Moonraker, I still enjoy (audiences at the time did too, as it was the highest grossing Bond film to that date) even though they basically just reused the plot of TSWLM and gave it a sci-fi twist to cash in on the science fiction craze Star Wars launched; it doesn't really belong in the Bond canon but... I still enjoy it. For Your Eyes Only was a great Bond film, and really brought things back down to earth where they belong, and honestly, Roger Moore should have called it quits with that one. I've read he wanted to, but Albert R. Broccoli talked him into making Octopussy, because he knew Connery was remaking Thunderball as NSNA, and he felt the "official" Bond would compete better with Moore than an unknown new guy. Moore's last film, A View to a Kill was not very good, IMHO, and an unfortunate swan song for him with the character.

[–] letess (1810) 13 days ago

I think after Sean, they insisted on trying to find someone who looked like him. Even James Brolin was considered. It then went the way of other actors who were associated with spy TV series. Moore for The Saint and Brosnan for Remington Steele. Where all they do is say a line and pose and purse their lips. Somehow, around 2005, Barbara Broccoli decided to switch gears and took the franchise in a different direction. How about we do a movie with a good relatively unknown actor (even a blond and who is shorter and young) and get a great script. Start at the beginning where Bond is formed into Bond because he falls in love. And that was the beauty of Casino Royale. Skyfall, not a Fleming novel, was also well written. Quantum Solace was written during the writers’ strike and that speaks for itself. I hated Spectre - it essentially stole all the highlights from a lot of Bond movies and then rehashed it. I am pretty sure when they scouted for this new Bond that Layer Cake played heavily on their decision making. But all of sudden with Casino Royale, the Bond film was actually bigger and better than the Bond actor, and that in turn cemented his place in the history of Bonds.

I don’t know if anyone remembers but Daniel Craig went through hell after it was announced he was the new Bond. Everyone disapproved. Later, after Casino Royale got rave reviews, it all changed. But before, he was blasted all over the place for not being Sean or Pierce.

[–] unlockingfreedom (332) 18 hours ago

The last Bond film No Time to Die was just awful. Immediately I knew with Bond being killed off at the end, it was the end of the franchise. Since 9/11 the West has embarked on illegal wars of aggression and lost all credibility. Iraq most notability the tipping point. The government itself relies on propaganda.

The collapse of Bond is another example of the well being empty and run out ideas.

[–] letess (1810) 17 hours ago

Spectre and No Time to Die weren’t good. I don’t think it’s the end of the franchise, just the end of the one with Craig. There is plenty they can do. It’s just a question of what direction they want to go in. Before Craig was announced as new Bond in 2005, Barbara Brocolli, probably influenced by Bourne, wanted to see a different Bond, less Fred Astaire. They chose Craig who was a good actor, didn’t look at all like previous Bonds, and changed the story format. No one liked Craig at the beginning; they took a real gamble. But Casino Royale just took the franchise to another level. They are having trouble now with what I don’t know. Casting, stories. But I think it’s because Brocolli might have to deal with other people. Actually, NEWS BULLETIN, she is stepping back apparently. Amazon MGM just acquired rights to the franchise. There’s also a different audience. This franchise should not be American. NO BEZOS. This is Britain’s baby. It should be 100% British.