ViewGuide

Created Jul 08, 2007 01:30PM PST • Edited Oct 23, 2022 08:10AM PST

1. Quality

2. Summary

   Perfect 5.0

   Is there a better Bond movie? From the B&W opening’s clever incorporation of Bond shooting at the camera, to ‘Bond, James Bond’ not coming till the final line, Casino Royale visits the de rigueur touchstones in fresh, inventive ways. Daniel Craig barely cracks a smile or a smirk, yet is funny all the way through, a man’s man and a lady’s man both. If the Blond Bond keeps this up, Sir Sean’s going to have to make room atop the Best Bond pedestal.

   It’s a perfect reboot.

4. Acting

   Great 4.0

5. Male Stars Perfect 5.0

6. Female Stars Great 4.0

7. Female Costars Very Good 3.5

8. Male Costars Great 4.0

10. Film

    Really Great 4.5

11. Direction Perfect 5.0

12. Play Perfect 5.0

13. Music Very Good 3.5

14. Visuals Really Great 4.5
15. Content

16. Edge

    Risqué 2.2

    Relatively chaste by Bond standards, he beds few women, none explicitly. The more interesting thing is that the sexiest creature in the movie is Bond himself, not the Bond Girls. Sure, my tastes run to cheesecake, making me not the best judge of beefcake. But you’d have to be blind to miss how the beef was prime cut, while the cheese was merely average.

17. Sex Titillating 2.0

18. Violence Brutal 3.0

    Hand-to-hand death fights, bullets to the head and other post-Wild Bunch brutalities make this – as has been widely reported – a grittier Bond. Roger Moore would be aghast, the smirk wiped right off his face.

19. Rudeness Polite 1.5

    Nothing notable

21. Reality

    Supernatural 3.7

    Hey, it is a James Bond movie. He’s supposed to be a flesh and blood super-hero, so long as he pulls it off with panache. He does and so the nearly 4x reality factor is like a continuous tickle.

22. Circumstantial Supernatural 4.0

    Bond is the ultimate lucky guy. Crane booms swing into position just when he needs to jump on them, he draws the inside straight when millions of dollars and lives are at stake, and his explosive exploits attract media attention only when advantageous.

23. Biological Supernatural 4.0

    Bond and the bad guys he chases possess super-human agility, coordination and stamina, pinballing through and around obstacles like Olympic gymnasts. Further, Bond’s pain tolerance and recovery from injury are many times normal.

24. Physical Surreal 3.0

    Bond and the villains’ human pinball chases are feats of physical improbability as much as super-human ability.