When we started this endeavor, to watch every Bond movie in the space of a month, I was really looking forward to seeing some of the movies I just never ended up seeing. This included the fabled 1967 spoof of Casino Royale starring Peter Niven as James Bond, Woody Allen as cousin “Jimmy” Bond, Peter Sellers as baccarat genius Evelyn Tremble (who also, inexplicably, becomes James Bond), Orson Welles as Le Chifre, former Bond Girl Ursula Andress as Vesper Lynd (who also, inexplicably, becomes James Bond), Moneypenny and Bond’s illegitimate daughter (who also, inexplicably, becomes James Bond). Confused? Join the club.
This movie is awful.
Rule #1 when doing a spoof? Be funny.
Rule #2 when doing spoof? Make deft and incisive references to your source material.
This movie fails where any number of other films succeed. Austin Powers is a great example of this. Casino Royale is not.
Despite being loosely based on the Ian Fleming novel Casino Royale, which was adapted in the 2006 Daniel Craig Bond reboot, the only resemblance I can really find to the source material are a few characters’ names and the plot point that “Bond” must win a game of baccarat at the Casino Royale in an attempt to put the financial screws on bad-guy-financier Le Chiffre.
There are a few tiny moments of good in this film. Almost all of them revolve around Woody Allen. Orson Welles doing slight of hand magic tricks is also pretty fun.
But the vast majority of the rest of this 131 minute psychedelic trainwreck in nigh unwatchable. It is boring. Second, while I normally like Burt Bacharach, his score here is awful. It sounds like a 60’s game show vomited all over an ice cream truck, and then repeated ad nauseum. Did I mention it has the power to induce vomiting? I watched this as I worked making some amazing collard greens and ham hocks (which was hundreds of times better than this film) and my wife, who is not a Bond fan and has suffered through me watching every other film so far, after 25 minutes demanded I put headphones on or she was going to go to another part of the house. That’s how annoying the score was.
Peter Sellers, who I normally love, was merely only watchable. And by that I meant that by comparison it didn’t make me want to gouge my eyes out like most of the rest of this movie. When things start getting all psychedelic and trippy? Done. Done.
If you want a great spoof of Bond, do not watch this. Watch Austin Powers.
1/2 Martini
