Those who grew up learning about 007 via the Hollywood screen rather than reading Ian Fleming have missed out on a lot. Gadgets and sex became more important than plot. In fact when you look at the original novels that many of the movies are based on, you’ll think that Hollywood had a disdain for plot. I guess that’s the result of B-rate directors and producers working with B-rate business people. Neither of them get it.
If you like 007 because of gadgets and random sex with beautiful bimbos, you won’t like Casino Royale. If you are a true martial artist – one who for instance has read Grossman’s On Killing – then you will totally get and deeply appreciate both the novel and the movie.
Go see the movie. I brought my 14- and 8-year-old boys to see it. I don’t recommend taking your kids to see shows about gratuitous violence. But that wasn’t the case at all here. The movie very much got into the personalities and psychological issues associated with this line of work. It’s the kind of thing I wanted my boys to see. It didn’t glorify the work of a 007. Quite the contrary, it put it into a very healthy (or perhaps unhealthy) perspective.
Four stars from me! This rendition of a Fleming novel deserves some awards.
– Bill Glasheen