This article is about the 1967 film, for other uses of this name, see
Casino Royale.
Casino Royale is a 1967 epic
surrealistic satire [1] originally produced by Columbia
Pictures starring an ensemble cast of directors and actors. It is set as a satire
of the James Bond film series and the spy genre and is lightly
based on Ian Fleming's first James Bond
novel.
The film stars David Niven as the original Bond, Sir James Bond 007. Forced out of
retirement to investigate the deaths and disappearances of international spies, he soon battles the mysterious Dr. Noah and
SMERSH.
The film's famous slogan : "Casino Royale is too much ... for one James Bond!" refers to Bond's ruse to confuse
SMERSH, six other agents are designated as "James Bond", namely, Baccarat master
Evelyn Tremble (Peter
Sellers), millionaire spy Vesper Lynd (Ursula
Andress), his secretary Miss Moneypenny (Barbara Bouchet), Bond's daughter with Mata Hari, Mata Bond (Joanna Pettet) and
British agents "Coop" (Terence Cooper) and "The Detainer" (Daliah Lavi).
Charles K. Feldman, the producer, had acquired the film rights and had attempted
to get Casino Royale made as an official James Bond movie (i.e. one made by EON
Productions); however, the producers of the official series, Albert R.
Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, had turned him down. Believing that he could not
compete with the official series, Feldman resolved to produce the film as a satire.[2]
Plot
Overview
The story of Casino Royale is told in an episodic format and is best outlined in "chapters". Val Guest oversaw the
assembly of the sections, although he turned down the credit of "co-ordinating director". [3]
Opening sequence
The film's opening sequence is a deliberate ironic take on the dramatic opening sequences in the Eon Bond films. Evelyn Tremble and Inspector Mathis meet in a pissoir
thus setting the satirical tone of the film.
Chapter 1 (director: John Huston)
The first chapter starts as the head of British MI6, M (John
Huston), and representatives of the CIA, KGB and French secret service drive to the country estate of Sir James Bond 007
(David Niven), a legendary British spy who retired from the secret service after luring the love of his life, Mata
Hari, to her death in front of a firing squad.
M and the others beg Bond to lend his leadership to a mission investigating the disappearance and deaths of secret agents
around the world. When Bond refuses, M orders a military strike on Bond's mansion; the mansion is destroyed, but M is killed in
the attack.
Bond's name has become symbolic of the spirit of the British secret service, to the extent that another individual has been
given his name and his number 007 to keep the legend alive. This no doubt refers to Sean
Connery's Bond, as Bond decries his replacement as being "oversexed" and unsuitable as a "real spy".
The chapter also sets the first of the film's many anachronisms, Mata Hari was executed
in 1917, 50 years prior to the movie's timeline, which would mean that Bond retired as a 20 year old.
Chapter 2 (director: John Huston)
Bond travels to Scotland to return M's remains, a toupee,
which is dubbed a 'hairloom' by Lady Fiona McTarry (Deborah Kerr), his grieving "widow".
Bond has to fend off the advances of McTarry's many young "daughters".
Lady Fiona is actually Agent Mimi, chosen to impersonate the widow since she has "the best Scots accent". Bond is invited to a ceremonial grouse shoot even though
grouse are out of season. Lady Fiona tells him "Whenever a McTarry dies, the grouse come into season."
That night, Bond handily defeats a gang of thugs in a cannonball throwing competition. Lady Fiona is so impressed with his
victory she starts telling him in French that he is magnificent. The other SMERSH agents begin to doubt her loyalty and imprison
her.
The next day the grouse turn out to be disguised flying bombs. Agent Mimi escapes and
helps Bond to foil the attack, he has a magnetic button that is being used to lead the grouse bombs towards him. Agent Mimi and
Bond launch the button back at the SMERSH agents who volley it back to them. After several such volleys, the button lands in the
launch truck, destroying it. Mimi subsequently leaves to join a convent.
Returning to London, Bond survives another attempt on his life involving a remote controlled dairy truck filled with
explosives. When the truck loses video contact with the controllers, it is put on auto-pilot. Entering his compound he opens and
closes the automatic gates; when they close, the chasing car skids sideways up against the gates. The truck then crashes into the
car and blows up.
Chapter 3 (director: Val Guest)
Bond is now promoted to the position of M and finds his secretary is his original
Miss Moneypenny's daughter, Miss Moneypenny, (Barbara
Bouchet). His first order is to rename all remaining MI6 agents "James Bond 007", as a ruse, to confuse the enemy. He also
orders that an irresistible male agent be found who has enough self-control to resist the charms of opposing female enemy
agents.
Such an agent is found in "Coop", Terence Cooper. He seduces Miss Moneypenny and she
becomes smitten with him, so he is picked to enter the anti-seduction by females training. This new James Bond 007 is even able
to resist the charms of M/Sir James' "secret weapon" - an exotic agent known as The Detainer (Daliah Lavi), herself another James Bond 007, this makes Coop want to have his head examined.
Chapter 4 (director: Joseph McGrath)
Bond recruits retired British secret agent, Vesper Lynd, played by Ursula Andress, to assist, by promising to have her tax arrears written off. She recruits baccarat master
Evelyn Tremble, played by Peter Sellers to challenge Le Chiffre at baccarat and bankrupt him in order to get at his employers,
SMERSH. Le Chiffre had embezzled SMERSH's money and plans to cheat at baccarat at Casino Royale in order to recover the money
After a brief fling with Vesper involving her photography and his dressing up as historical figures Hitler, Napoleon and Toulouse-Lautrec, Tremble agrees to become involved in the plans and receives a whirlwind
indoctrination into the ways of spying from Q.
Logically, this chapter should occur after the Mata Bond sequence that that follows, as Le Chiffre is playing baccarat in this
chapter because of the loss of money from the auction she disrupts in the next.
Chapter 5 (director: Ken Hughes)
Bond reconciles with his estranged daughter Mata Bond (Joanna Pettet) who looks just
like her mother, Mata Hari. Mata spends her time giving, what Bond calls, poor dance recitals.
Recruited into MI6, and is sent to Berlin from London
in a taxi driven by Carlton Towers, a British Foreign Office official played by Bernard
Cribbins in order to infiltrate "International Mother's Help," a school for nannies. It is
in reality a SMERSH spy school and is where Agent Mimi and the others had received their orders to intercept Bond in
Scotland.
Mata encounters her mother's instructors including the diminutive Polo, played by Ronnie
Corbett, who was in love with her mother and now falls in love with her. She discovers a plan to sell compromising
photographs of military leaders from the United States, USSR, China and Great Britain at an
"art auction." She is told not to let the auction take place successfully. The pictures are being sold by Le Chiffre in order to
make money to pay back SMERSH after he had embezzled the organisation's money. Mata
grabs the 35mm slides, outwits the staff, and throws the photos away. Carlton Towers helps her to escape. Upon hearing the news,
Le Chiffre realizes he will have to raise the money by gambling in the casino.
The Berlin scenery has an anachronistic feel including features germane to both World War II and the Cold War. The set design is a clear parody of German Expressionist
cinema. However, a lot of the school's decor and some of the references are to World War I. This is another mixture of
time periods, with Mata Hari's teachers looking no older than 50.
Chapter 6 (directors: Joseph McGrath, Robert Parrish)
Evelyn Tremble arrives in France accompanied by Vesper Lynd for his encounter with Le Chiffre at the Casino Royale. Vesper
foils an attempt by Miss Goodthighs, a SMERSH agent, to
kill Evelyn.
He survives to face Le Chiffre, who amuses the crowd with elaborate magic tricks and illusions before playing and cheating at
Baccarat. Vesper replaces the trick sunglasses Le Chiffre uses to cheat. After losing and having more funds credited to him,
Tremble beats Le Chiffre at baccarat and wins the entire pot. While leaving Casino Royale, Vesper is kidnapped, and Tremble
chases the kidnappers in a Lotus Formula Three car.
Tremble himself is kidnapped and tortured by Le Chiffre. During a hallucinogenic torture sequence, which involves a huge group
of bagpipers and Peter O'Toole asking Tremble if he is Richard Burton, a reference to a joke in What's New
Pussycat?, Vesper arrives in the hallucination and, with a bagpipe, slays all the bagpipe players. Tremble alone is
still standing. Vesper then faces him and says, "Never trust a rich spy" and fires again. Le Chiffre is killed in a suitably
bizarre fashion as a punishment by SMERSH for failing: a gun smashes out of his monitor screen and shoots him in the head.
This is one of the most surrealistic parts of the film, and the Lotus scene was usually cut out when played on network
television. Besides inexplicably jumping from Tremble driving off to his being in Le Chiffre's clutches, Vesper's arrival in the
hallucination is never explained nor is it made clear if it is a real event. In addition, Tremble is never actually shown being
shot or falling down; when the establishing shot is revisited, he simply is not standing in the shot anymore. These
discontinuities were the result of Sellers leaving the production before finishing his scenes.[4]
Chapter 7 (directors: Val Guest, Richard Talmadge)
After Mata Bond is kidnapped from the heart of London, by an agent of SMERSH disguised as a palace guard, on a horse and taken
away in a giant flying saucer that lands where Nelson's Column stood before it had been bought by Vesper Lynd, Bond travels with Miss Moneypenny to
Casino Royale to rescue her. They discover that the casino is located atop a giant underground base run by Dr. Noah. He turns out
to be Bond's weak-kneed nephew, Jimmy Bond (Woody Allen), last seen escaping a firing squad
in Central America earlier in the film. Unable to speak in Bond's presence, Dr. Noah's
plan is to kill all men over 4 foot 6 inches tall, leaving the diminutive villain himself the "big man" who gets all the girls.
Meanwhile, a huge brawl breaks out in the casino involving secret agents, a French Legionnaire (Jean-Paul Belmondo), stereotypical movie cowboys and Indians, George Raft and William Holden.
The Detainer foils Dr. Noah's plans by successfully poisoning him with his own atomic pill. This leads to an explosive finale
in which Casino Royale, along with practically all of the characters, is destroyed. As the film ends, the seven Bonds are seen in
Heaven as harp playing angels, including Dr.Noah – a fact quickly rectified as the ghost-like
angel of Evelyn Tremble still in a kilt, sends Jimmy "to a place where it's terribly...hot."
This version of Casino Royale is notable as being the only Bond film in which Bond dies.
Cast
- See also: List of James
Bond characters in Casino Royale
- David Niven as Sir James Bond 007 – A
legendary British secret agent forced out of retirement to fight SMERSH. David Niven,
had, in fact, been Ian Fleming's preference for the part of James Bond.[5], EON Productions, however, chose
Sean Connery for their series. David Niven is the only James Bond actor who is mentioned by
name in the text of one of Fleming's James Bond novels. In On Her Majesty's
Secret Service, Bond visits an exclusive ski resort in Switzerland and is told
that David Niven is a frequent visitor.
- Peter Sellers as Evelyn Tremble – A Baccarat Master
recruited to challenge Le Chiffre at Casino Royale.
- Ursula Andress as Vesper Lynd – A
retired British secret agent forced back into service in exchange for writing off her tax arrears.
- Orson Welles as Le Chiffre – SMERSH's
financial agent, desperate to win at baccarat in order to repay the money he has embezzled from the organisation.
- Woody Allen as Dr.Noah/Jimmy Bond – Bond's nephew and head of SMERSH.
- Barbara Bouchet as Miss
Moneypenny – The beautiful daughter of Bond's original Miss Moneypenny who helps him in his fight against SMERSH.
- Deborah Kerr as Agent Mimi/Lady Fiona McTarry – A SMERSH agent who masquerades as the
widow of M but cannot help falling in love with Bond.
- Jacqueline Bisset as Miss Goodthighs – A SMERSH agent who attempts to kill Evelyn Tremble
but is killed by Vesper Lynd.
- Joanna Pettet as Mata Bond – Bond's daughter, born of his love affair with
Mata Hari.
- Daliah Lavi as The Detainer – A British secret agent who successfully
poisons Dr.Noah with his own atomic pill.
- Terence Cooper as Coop – A British secret agent trained to resist the
charms of women, making him think he is mad for doing so.
- Bernard Cribbins as Carlton Towers – A British Foreign Office
official who drives Mata Bond all the way from London to Berlin in his taxi.
- Ronnie Corbett as Polo – A SMERSH agent at the International Mothers'
Help who was in love with Mata Hari and expresses the same feelings for Mata Bond but is outwitted by her.
- John Huston as M/McTarry – Head of
MI6, dies from an explosion caused by his bombardment of Bond's estate.
- William Holden as Ransom – A CIA agent who accompanies M to persuade Bond out of retirement, then reappears in the final
climactic fight scene.
- Charles Boyer as LeGrand – A Deuxième
Bureau agent who accompanies M and Ransom to see Bond.
Casino Royale also takes credit for the greatest number of actors in a Bond movie either to have appeared or to go on
to appear in the rest of the 'official' series — besides Ursula Andress in
Dr. No, Vladek Sheybal appeared as
Kronsteen in From Russia with Love, Burt Kwouk featured as Mr
Ling in Goldfinger and an unnamed SPECTRE
operative in You Only Live Twice, Jeanne Roland plays a
masseuse in You Only Live Twice, and
Angela Scoular appeared as Ruby Bartlett in On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Caroline
Munro, who was an extra, received the role of Naomi in The Spy Who Loved
Me.
Major stars like George Raft and Jean-Paul Belmondo were given top billing in the film's promotion and screen trailers despite the fact that they only appeared for a few minutes in the final film sequence.
[6]
Well established stars like Peter O'Toole and
sporting legends like Stirling Moss were prepared to take uncredited parts in the film
just to be able to work with the other members of the cast.[6] The film also proved to be young Anjelica Huston's
first experience of work in the movie industry as she was called upon by her father, John
Huston, to cover the screen shots of Deborah Kerr's hands. [6]
Production
Directors
The production proved to be rather troubled, with five different directors helming different segments of the film. In addition
to the credited writers, Woody Allen, Peter Sellers,
Val Guest, Ben Hecht, Joseph Heller, Terry Southern, and Billy Wilder are believed to have added to the screenplay. Val Guest was given the responsibility of
splicing the various "chapters" together, and was offered the unique title of "Co-ordinating Director" but declined, claiming the
chaotic plot would not reflect well on him if he were so credited. His extra credit was labeled "Additional Sequences" instead.
[3]
Budget
The studio approved the film's production budget of $6 million, already quite a large budget in 1966. However, during filming
the project ran into several problems and the shoot ran months over schedule, with the costs also running well over. When the
film was finally completed it had run twice over its original budget. The final production budget of $12 million made it one of
the most expensive films that had been made to that point. The previous official Bond movie, Thunderball, had a budget of $11 million while You Only Live Twice, which was released the same year as Casino Royale, had a budget of
$9.5 million. The extremely high budget of "Casino Royale" caused it to earn the reputation as being "a runaway
mini-Cleopatra,"[7] referring to the runaway and out of
control costs of the 1963 film Cleopatra. The film was due to be released in time for
Christmas 1966 but premiered in April 1967.
Feud
The film is notable for the legendary behind-the-scenes drama involving the filming of the segments with Peter Sellers. Supposedly, Sellers felt intimidated by Orson Welles
to the extent that, except for a couple of shots, neither were in the studio simultaneously. Other versions of the legend depict
the drama stemming from Sellers being slighted, in favour of Welles, by Princess Margaret (whom Sellers knew) during her visit to the set. Welles also
insisted on performing magic tricks as Le Chiffre, and the director obliged. Sellers ultimately walked off the film before he
completed all his scenes, which is why Tremble is so abruptly captured. Some biographies of Sellers suggest that he took the role
of Bond to heart, and was annoyed at the decision to make Casino Royale a comedy as he wanted to play Bond straight; this
is illustrated (in somewhat fictionalized form) in the film The Life and
Death of Peter Sellers, based upon a biography by Roger Lewis, who claims that
Sellers kept re-writing and improvising scenes himself to make them play seriously. This would match that the only parts of the
film close to the book are the ones featuring Sellers and Welles. [8]
Missing footage
Eventually, Sellers' involvement with the film ended. Whether or not he was fired or simply walked off is unclear. Given that
he often left for days at a time, improvised scenes or re-wrote parts, and given the conflicts between him and Orson Welles, it
would hardly be surprising whatever the explanation. [8] Regardless, not having the principal character of the novel's story available left the
film-makers without a beginning or an ending, as well as often missing much of the linking footage to explain the details. The
framing device of the rest of the film with David Niven, was invented to salvage the
footage, as is clear from watching the film. [2]
Signs of missing footage from the Sellers segments are evident at various points. The entire Evelyn Tremble kidnap scene is
gone - instead, an out-take of Sellers messing about on set with a racing car was substituted. Sellers calls for the car, a la
Pink Panther, to chase down Vesper and her kidnappers; the next thing that is shown is Tremble being tortured. Outtakes of
Sellers were also used for Tremble's dream sequence (pretending to play the piano on Ursula
Andress' torso), in the finale (blowing out the candles whilst in highland dress) and in the end of the film when all the
various "James Bond doubles" are together. In the kidnap sequence, Tremble's death is also very abruptly inserted: it consists of
pre-existing footage of Sellers being rescued by Vesper, followed by a later-filmed shot of her abruptly deciding to shoot
Tremble, followed by a freeze-frame over some of the previous footage of her surrounded by bodies (noticeably a zoom-in on the
previous shot). Equally telling is there is never any explanation of why Vesper shoots Tremble. [2]
So many sequences from the film ended on the cutting room floor that several well-known actors were cut from the movie
altogether, including Mona Washbourne and Arthur
Mullard. [2]
Final sequence
Jean Paul Belmondo and George Raft received
major billing, even though both actors appear only briefly. Both appear during the
climactic brawl at the end, Raft flipping his trademark coin and promptly shooting himself dead with a backwards-firing pistol,
while Belmondo appears wearing a fake moustache as the French Foreign Legion
officer who requires an English phrase book to say 'ooch!' when he punches people. [6] At the Intercon science fiction convention held in Slough in 1978, Dave Prowse commented on his part in this film, apparently
his big-screen debut. He claimed that he was originally asked to play "Super Pooh", a giant Winnie The Pooh in a superhero costume who attacks Tremble during the Torture Of The Mind sequence. This
idea, as with many others in the film's script, was rapidly dropped, and Prowse was re-cast as Frankenstein's Monster for the closing scenes. The final sequence was principally directed by
former actor and stuntman Richard Talmadge. [2]
Rights
Columbia Pictures produced and distributed this version of Casino Royale. In
1997, following the Columbia/MGM/Kevin McClory lawsuit on ownership of the Bond film
series, the rights to the film reverted to MGM (whose sister company United Artists
co-owns the Bond film franchise) as a condition of the settlement. Years later, as a result of the Sony/Comcast acquisition of MGM, Columbia once again became
responsible for the distribution of this 1967 version as well as the co-distribution of the entire Bond series, including the
2006 adaptation of Casino Royale [9]
Reception
The "chaotic" nature of the production was featured heavily in contemporary reviews. Roger
Ebert said "This is possibly the most indulgent film ever made,"[10] and Variety said "it lacked discipline and
cohesion." [11]
Despite the lukewarm nature of the reviews the pull of the James Bond name was sufficient to make it the third highest
grossing movie in North America in 1967 with a gross of $22,744,718 and a worldwide total of $41,744,718 ($252,000,000 adjusted).
[12]
Orson Welles attributed the success of the film to a marketing strategy that featured a
naked tattooed lady on the film's posters and print ads. [6]
Music
The original music is by Burt Bacharach. Herb Alpert
& the Tijuana Brass performed some of the songs with Mike Redway singing the lyrics to the title song as the end
credits rolled.
The single most successful element of the film was the song "The Look Of
Love", performed by Dusty Springfield and heard during a Peter Sellers segment.
Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Song, it has become a standard for its era, with the biggest-selling version
recorded by Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66 (#4 on the Billboard pop charts in 1968). It was
heard again in the first Austin Powers film, which was to a
degree inspired by Casino Royale.
John Barry's song "Born Free" was also used
in the film. At the time, Barry was the main composer for the official Bond series.
The original album cover art was done by Robert McGinnis, based on the movie poster
and the original stereo vinyl release of the soundtrack is still highly sought after by audiophiles. It is regarded by many music critics as the finest-sounding album of all time. [13][14]
Soundtrack listing
- "Casino Royale Theme" - Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass
- "The Look Of Love" - Dusty Springfield
- "Money Penny Goes For Broke"
- "Le Chiffre's Torture Of The Mind"
- "Home James, Don't Spare The Horses"
- "Sir James' Trip To Find Mata"
- "The Look Of Love (Instrumental)"
- "Hi There Miss Goodthighs"
- "Little French Boy"
- "Flying Saucer" - First Stop Berlin
- "The Venerable Sir James Bond"
- "Dream On James, You're Winning"
- "The Big Cowboys And Indians Fight At Casino Royale / Casino Royale Theme (reprise)"
One track notable by its omission from the soundtrack is the instrumental piece "Bond Street", heard in the film during the
brawl at the military auction and Carlton Towers's and Mata Bond's subsequent escape. It bears a fair resemblance to the
non-Casino Royale-related instrumental, "Yakety Sax" (as frequently heard on
The Benny Hill Show ). In fact, either accidentally or deliberately, "Bond
Street" has been used in other shows to soundtrack Benny Hill-style scenes, such as
Stewie Griffin's "sexy parties" in Family Guy.
"Bond Street" itself has since appeared on the early-90s easy listening compilation CD,
This Is...Easy.
References
- ^ Von Dassanowsky, Robert. Casino Royale, The Post-Modern Epic
in spite of itself. Retrieved on 2007-09-13.
- ^ a b c d e
- ^ a b
- ^ Lane, Andy & Simpson, Paul (2002). The Bond Files. Virgin
Publishing. ISBN 0-753-50712-9.
- ^ Ian Fleming, Author or Spy ?. Retrieved on 2007-08-24.
- ^ a b c d e
- ^ Casino Royale - Through the Looking Glass Shatterhand007.com. Retrieved May 29, 2007.
- ^ a b The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, Lewis, Roger, Applause Books, ISBN
1-557-83248-X, 2000
- ^ "Sony Pictures, in an accord with MGM, drops its plan to produce new James Bond movies.",
New York Times, 1999-03-30. Retrieved on 2007-09-14.
- ^ Ebert, Roger. Casino Royale, review by Roger Ebert (May 1 1967).
Rogerebert.com. Retrieved May 29 2007.
- ^ Casino Royale, review by Variety (May 1967). Variety.com. Retrieved May 29,
2007.
- ^ Casino Royale - Box Office Data, Movie News, Cast Information. Retrieved on 2007-09-05.
- ^ Stachler, Joe. Joe Stachler on Casino Royale's Great Soundtrack. Retrieved on 2006-12-22.
- ^ Panek, Richard. 'Casino
Royale' Is an LP Bond With A Gilt Edge. Retrieved on 2006-12-22.
External links
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