Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with today’s installment of A Movie A Day.
[For those now joining us, A Movie A Day is my attempt at filling in gaps in my film knowledge. My DVD collection is thousands strong, many of them films I haven’t seen yet, but picked up as I scoured used DVD stores. Each day I’ll pull a previously unseen film from my collection or from my DVR and discuss it here. Each movie will have some sort of connection to the one before it, be it cast or crew member.]
Our fourth and final film in the second annual AMAD Peter Sellers-A-Thon is today’s CASINO ROYALE, a genuinely odd film jumping off of the very popular James Bond films of the early and mid-60s and actually based on one of Ian Fleming’s books (loosely).
I was going to start this off really cute… talking about how Quantum of Solace was okay, but that I heard it was a direct continuation of CASINO ROYALE and I don’t think Marc Forster did a good job because none of the continuity is the same. Sure, David Niven is dead, but you can still find Woody Allen to reprise his role as James Bond’s idiot nephew and that Vesper Lynd in the flashbacks didn’t look like Ursula Andress. I was going to try to Vern it up a little bit, but then I realized I should leave that stuff to the professionals.
The main aspect of the CASINO ROYALE story is indeed a part of this film… The British Secret Service needs to stop the nefarious Le Chiffre (played here by Orson Bloody-Hell Welles), a brilliant and respected gambler, from winning a huge Baccarat game that could fund his terrorist activities.
That, however, is a small part of this movie. The focus is on James Bond Sr., the original and uptight Bond (played by the great David Niven) who hates that his name and number has been sexed up and misrepresented by a string of James Bond 007s who rely on gadgets and not spy work.
He has a bumbling nephew, played by Woody Allen, who isn’t fit for the title and above that, M has also started employing a slew of James Bond 007s as SPECTRE eliminates agents all over the world. In order to train these new 007s they have to bring the original, chaste and proper Bond out of retirement.
Disjointed doesn’t even begin to describe this movie, with multiple credited directors, screenwriters and varying roaming plot threads that never really tie up. The most interesting subplot is indeed Peter Sellers’ character, who is a well known Baccarat player who is seduced and recruited by Ursela Andress’ Vesper Lynd (who is also a 007). This character isn’t interesting because of any written material, but that Sellers is fucking hilarious, as usual.
What’s really fucking weird about this movie is that it’s a half-spoof. Half of it is just as zany and ridiculous as any of the Zucker Bros movies, but half of it actually tries to stick to telling a James Bond story. CASINO ROYALE is a unique and beautiful butterfly in that respect. You could not make this movie today. The film stock, the filmmaking technique, etc has all evolved and any attempt at doing something like this now would just come off as empty mimicry.
It’s kind of why I have a very big soft spot for JAWS 2. It’s an emptier version of the first movie, but the film stock, locations and actors of the time make it feel like it exists in the exact same universe as the first one.
That is only helped by the addition of Ursula Andress as Lynd. How weird is that? That’d be like them doing a spoof of the Batman films and having Michael Caine show up for a major role.
Woody Allen shines again in this early role. I’d worry about spoiling the movie, but it’s pretty clear when you see Allen show up for 40 seconds at the beginning of the flick and then disappear for an hour and a half that you’ll see him again in the end. He plays Dr. Noah, the evil mastermind of the story with a ridiculous swallowable capsule nuke to get rid of the world’s men so he can finally get laid. I took today’s subhead from this finale which is Allen’s real time to shine.
Niven is likable as always, but honestly felt a little flat here for me. He doesn’t phone it in, but his character doesn’t click for some reason. He almost seems bored or at least just frustrated with how hodgepodge the production was through most of the flick, but he does perk up for a few scenes, the best of which is probably a visit to a Scottish house filled with women trying to seduce him and bust his goodie two-shoes reputation. This involves an explosive flying fake duck, magnet buttons and suspender slingshots.
Oddly enough, scuttlebutt is that Niven was actually Ian Fleming’s original choice to play James Bond… I love the dude, but if his work here is any indicator it’s a good thing Connery got the gig.
If you give this one a spin or a re-watch, keep an eye out for a genuinely funny cameo by Peter O’Toole, a nod the Tom Jones title song from a previous Sellers AMAD title WHAT’S NEW PUSSYCAT? and a cameo by Cato (Burt Kwouk) as a Chinese soldier.
Final Thoughts: The flick is a mess, no doubt about it, but it’s a fascinating mess. The fact that it’s almost James Bond canon in some weird way helps that, but mostly it’s the cast of comedy greats. I especially loved the magician version of Le Chiffre as played by Orson Welles. He goes out way too soon, in my opinion. I don’t know if there’s much value in this outside of a morbid curiocity, but it’s not all bad, just not all good.
Here’s what we have lined up for the next week:
Friday, December 19th: THE STRANGER (1946)
Saturday, December 20th: BROTHER ORCHID (1940)
Sunday, December 21st: THE PETRIFIED FOREST (1936)
Monday, December 22nd: MOONTIDE (1942)
Tuesday, December 23rd: NOTORIOUS (1946)
Wednesday, December 24th: THE INN OF THE SIXTH HAPPINESS (1958)
Thursday, December 25th: THE HIGH COMMISSIONER (1968)
Tomorrow we follow Orson Welles back to the noir thriller THE STRANGER, co-starring Edward G. Robinson! See you folks for that one!
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
