The Beginning of a New Era

Most of you know that I am a James Bond junkie. I've seen all the movies several times, most of them many many times. My enjoyment of the flicks is not always based on who is Bond. It's more about the movie itself. My favorites have always been the ones with minimal over-the-top factor: From Russia With Love, You Only Live Twice, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, For Your Eyes Only (my favorite.) Now, add Casino Royale to my top favorites. I saw it last night, and it's easily my favorite Bond flick of the last 25 years (dating back to FYEO, made in 1981) ... and it's closely comparable to FYEO for a lot of the same reasons... good story, minimal crazy gadgets, no elaborate villain lairs, no 'destroy the world' schemes, and a classically beautiful brunette 'Bond girl.'

Here's my review (broken down by the major components that make up a Bond flick) ... some moderate spoilers are below, but I won't give away any of the plot:

Pre-titles opening sequence: Done in black and white, which was a really cool touch. It really set the tone for this new 'old' Bond. It also gave an excellent 'back story' for the iconic Bond opening that has come with every one of the real films (the shot of Bond through a gun barrell.) Not the Best pre-titles sequence of the series, but it was still pretty good. It's purpose was more to give a little background than to get the adrenaline going... but it managed to do both.

Story: Most Bond flicks don't really have much of a story. Small problem becomes big problem, bond solves the problem, and gets the girl. yay. But, there are varying degrees of narrative quality within the series, and this one was good. Since there wasn't a lot of gadgets or elaborate villain lairs, or over the top sidekicks, the movie had to be carried by the plot. It worked well.

Titles: No naked women sihlouettes, much to my chagrin. But they were artfully done, with a neat cell-shaded animation look. I enjoyed the title sequence.

Title Song: Definitely not the best. I'd actually put it in the lower half. Chris Cornell (I think he was in Stone Temple Pilots) sang it. It was pretty forgettable.

Score: I loved the score. It was decidedly old school bond, harkening back to the Connery days with violins and harps carrying the load. Very well done. The quintessential Bond Theme didn't make an appearance until the very end.

Gadgets: Almost no gadgets. A few modern day necessities (RFID chip, cell phones), but no idiotic crazy stuff like invisible cars, inflatable spheres, or other Q branch craziness. I've never been a huge fan of the Q branch gadgets, but I have always loved the ubiquitous Q Branch scene and the Q character (both Desmond Lewellyn and especially when John Cleese assumed the role) and was disappointed that Cleese didn't make an appearance in the film.

Villains: One of the marks of the Bond series has always been the memorable villains. Casino Royale's villains aren't terribly memorable. I'm guessing the film makers didn't want to have a villain overshadow Bond in Craig's first flim. It's ok - I happen to agree with that move.

Womens: Bond's first encounter with a woman was not entirely memorable - she was exotic and beautiful, but not much else was there. But Eva Green was excellent, and has moved into my vaunted upper echelon of Bond Women. She's a gorgeous brunette, and a good actress. Unfortunately, there wasn't a lot of depth to her character, so she doesn't move into the top 5.

Casino Action: Well.. you'd think that if the word Casino is in the title, then it will have some casino action, particularly since the majority of Bond flicks have at least some sort of casino scene. In this edition, the casino scene plays an integral part in the plot, which pleases me.

Locations: Lots of great locations in this one... Prague, Bahamas, Miami, Montenegro, Italy, Madagascar, and of course, London.

Bond: I've always been more about the individual movie's merits than about which Bond is best. They all have their strong points. Even Timothy Dalton wasn't too bad - he was more of a victim of bad scripts than being a bad bond. I liked Connery's arrogance and coolness. I liked Moore's delivery and sense of humor. I enjoyed Lazenby's portrayal as a whole.. and Brosnan, well, I think he's the best actor to have played Bond. I really enjoyed Craig's portrayal. I think he's going to be great in the role, and may turn out to be the best of all of them. I definitely think he's the closest to what Flemming had in mind when he wrote the novels.

Overall, I very much enjoyed Casino Royale. It's easily the my favorite since FYEO, and I liked it better than most that came before it. Definitely in my top 5, and possibly in my top 3. Go see it. Now.

Spam Lampoon of the Day

This isn't the usual subject line.... it's the text within the spam that will be the object of today's ridicule. 9999 times out of 10,000 I don't open spam. But for some reason, my soul called out to me to open this one. I'm glad I did. It was SO worth it. The random nature of the text is delicious... I love random, and this was obviously done by one of those random sentence generators... enjoy:

Another infected Chainsaw
An incinerated stovepipe ruminates, because a line dancer pees on a fighter pilot defined by an apartment building. A ball bearing feels nagging remorse, and a radioactive buzzard goes to sleep; however, a feline squid learns a hard lesson from a sheriff. Now and then, the stovepipe related to another demon knows a somewhat fashionable cab driver. The cashier flies into a rage, but another bullfrog for the senator barely recognizes the lazily self-actualized hole puncher. iron fillings on Alpha Proxima. For a sperm whale. In fact and squelched at it dropped out of cows. - said Zaphod. - You want it. it swam sickeningly through the computer, the sound of book, was billowing out of to in Improbability Drive, - Well, maybe six, - said Arthur. The two to end? - Understand that! - A quick a small gold all lovingly made him towards one followed the murky depths. - The way see any... A computer screen a to be necessary, - or define,
Any fundraiser can find lice on another green industrial complex, but it takes a real bottle of beer to sanitize a briar patch toward a CEO. Some turkey can be kind to a shabby wedding dress. Now and then, a nation over a dust bunny plans an escape from a girl scout an almost paternal fire hydrant. A tornado can be kind to the turkey for the hole puncher. A hole puncher toward a fire hydrant competes with the paper napkin.
movement, clapped his reasons whose two-man crew of creation. Arthur blinked at it would have. Chapter 9 Plural Z finally to make it were screaming through the air with life, of the conversation, having merely had become it one poetry at that they become economists, its... - he was like to build another drear morning Arthur Dent's house got problems. Arthur once off a single of something. - said Ford ignored to the only archipelago of paper, which contained her again. There.

(end of spam)

There are several things about this that make me laugh... overall, this sort of random junk is right up my alley. Back in the pre-internet day when you had to have your modem dial into a specific BBS in order to post on a forum (as opposed to logging in to the internet and having them ALL at your disposal) my friends and I used to write an ongoing story that was nothing but random junk like this, and it always made me chuckle.

Specifically: First - the first line 'another infected chainsaw' immediately got me laughing... as if the writer was continually beset with infected chainsaws, which constantly ruined his/her day. Second, the sentence about "any fundraiser can find lice on another green industrial complex" made me guffaw, and started an uncontrollable cascade of laughter. Third: the numerous references to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy added to the hillarity - that's one of my favorite series of books, one of the funniest things ever written in my opinion. Fourth, the line "Arthur Dent's house got problems" just about made me pee my pants and successfully expelled every molecule of air out of my lungs. For anyone who has read the books or seen the movie, you know that that line is a hillarious understatement. Lastly, the point at which I lost consciousness and inverted my lung was the last word.... ending with "there." was the last straw... my lungs, already empty from laughter were completely ejected from my chest cavity upon reading of that declarative.

Speaking of damned funny stuff... I saw something on TV that just about killed me the other day, it's the funniest thing I've seen on TV in a long time (other than Robot Chicken) ... it was on 30 Rock, which is Tina Fey's new show. I'll start by saying that I find Tina to be Uber sexy - she's smart and hillarious in addition to being physically appealing. So I don't quite understand the bits on her show about her not being appealing. On this week's show, she was convinced by one of her employees to wear a slutty 'sexy' dress... and when she walked into the writer's meeting they all reacted with disgust, and one writer in particular (who is the type that most likely has never had consensual sex with a woman that wasn't paid for) had a look of obvious horror on his face, and yelled 'You're making me GAY!' Not sure why that made me laugh so hard that I missed the next two minutes of the show... but it did. Thank you, DVR.