You Know My Name

I've been mulling over Casino Royale since seeing it last week. I'd been looking forward to it since seeing the trailer last month and enjoyed it immensely. It could be because I watched it on the heels of The Atrocity Known As Happy Feet, but I don't think so.

---THAR BE SPOILERS AHEAD---

There were barely any gadgets at all in this movie and no Q. This caused me a slight pang as I am a gadget monster. The result is that Daniel Craig does a lot of hand-on-hand fighting and also does a tremendous amount of running. Perhaps MI6 should teach agents to hotwire a car?

Judi Dench was sublime as M. She delivered lines like "God I miss the Cold War. When agents screwed up like this, they would defect," with bite. There was no Moneypenny, though M's male assistant had fun putting Bond on hold during a crisis.

The fabulous Bond theme was there. I don't think they'll ever be able to get rid of that. It's too good. Chris Cornell's "You Know My Name" opener is on my ipod right now, getting repeated play. I've started digging through The Serene One's music collection of Soundgarden and Audioslave to hear Cornell's voice in other stuff. The Serene One is succeeding in invading more and more space on my ipod.

Mads Mikkelson (pronounced 'mass') was a decent villain. Mean and a coward. The bleeding eye thing was kinda over the top. I guess if they didn't do that he might be too cute. Denmark may be a small country, but they have good genes. Examples: Mads and Viggo.

My favorite part? VisionaryM would probably say all the parts where Daniel Craig is scantily clad. He is yummy, but I enjoyed the Eva Green/Daniel Craig chemistry more. Nothing like having someone around to hook you up to a defibrillator when you're having a chemically induced heart attack.