We’ve talked about a couple Bond-related projects lately, so let’s talk about one of the most unique and oddball ones of them all. It’s a Bond film, that also happens to be a Bond parody…in the most bizarre, convoluted way possible…and it’s also one that happened to have an insane amount of production put into it. Hell, it’s a Bond film that has not one but at least two female Bonds fifty years before anyone started seriously talking about the idea. In fact, it’s that kind of film that you can only feel like a raving lunatic whenever you try and describe it. It’s Casino Royale…no, not that one.
How did this film come about? Well, like a lot of things around the top spy franchise, it’s far more convoluted than it has any right to be. You see, technically speaking the first Bond screen adaptation, based solely on the book Casino Royale, was made for US television in 1955, boasting the character ‘Jimmy Bond’—and this prompted our favorite reactionary writer Ian Fleming to sell the movie rights for that book and that book alone along to a producer, who then passed away, whose estate than sold those rights, which then ended up with Columbia Pictures, who then decided to make their own movie effort while the original series under EON Productions was ongoing.
Got all that? Do you feel like you just completely lost the plot on reality? Then good! That’ll prep you for what the actual film is like!
The initial focus is about the ‘real’ James Bond, being played by David Niven as someone whose sensibilities froze around 1914, being pulled out retirement due to attacks by the mysterious organization SMERSH. Things start off in the vein of a typical and groan worthy sixties sex comedy, with this Bond, ironically, seemingly being quite celibate. That ends up not going anywhere, and soon Niven-Bond takes command of the secret service, with the daring ploy to confuse the foe by naming every agent ‘James Bond!’ This includes actual Bond actress Ursula Andress as our first female Bond, and film comedy legend Peter Sellers, who, er…well, we’ll get to him.
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| Too late does Mr. Niven realize what kind of bugnuttery he's in for. |
The thing you’ll note is how oddly lavish this film is, between its grand sets and its major stars, and how oddly squandered all that lavishness is. There’s a scene where Niven-Bond decides to recruit his estranged daughter Mata (Joanna Pettit) for our second female Bond, and we’re treated to a rather elaborate Indian-style dance number. This looks nice, but damned if it serves any purpose beyond showing…she can dance? Anyway, she herself ends up infiltrating an East German spy center, which is all dressed up in an surreal Expressionist style. The sets look real nice, but again, the script is awkward as all hell—even if there are a few bemusing moments here and there.
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| You might have several questions, like "why is she dressed like that", or "what's that" or "what's everything." And the answer is...look over there! |
Still, around this point we’re introduced to our first bad guy Le Chiffre—played by none other than cinematic legend Orson Welles himself. Welles of course bring his usual gravitas and screen presence to a role where he ends up doing not much beyond exchange baffling quips with Peter Sellers Bond, when we get to the actual Casino Royale. Again, everything here is technically well done and festooned, but Sellers ends up just saying things in random accents while playing card games because…erm…funny?
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| "Rosebud schmosebud, I'll look stupid as long as that free Don Perignon keeps coming!" |
Not long after that, Sellers-Bond goes through a psychedelic ‘torture’ sequence, where Orson Welles I guess fires acid trips at him through a periscope, or something--and then abruptly ends up shot. Why? Because Sellers basically just walked off the production, leaving the directors to try and pull together a film that was already becoming a barely coherent octopus of a project—and how did they do that? By basically giving up on making any sense whatsoever!
Let me describe the best I can what happens next in the proceedings. Joanna Pettet ends up with Niven in London, walking around…then she gets kidnapped by bad guys…who then ride a horse straight onto a flying saucer that appears out of nowhere and lands in Trafalgar Square. If you feel like your brain just parachuted out of your head, excellent. I think by now that was the intended effect.
Anyhoo, it turns out our bad guy was Woody Allen all along! Yeah, he appears as Niven-Bond’s nephew, has one of the few actually kind of funny scenes earlier on, and it transpires that his plan is to kill all men more attractive than he is so that women will love him. Woody Allen turning out to be a jealous creep, who’d have thunk.
Once again, our climax sees insanely well-looking sets and design that barely appears and seems to be a result of our half-dozen directors just indulging themselves because they could. And how does it end? With a great big brawl where we completely lost what little sense was left, where everyone starts fighting everyone for no real reason, where we get interrupted by Wild West stock footage, and then everyone explodes and dies. By no means is it boring, but it will leave you sitting stupefied for at least five straight minutes.
To best describe watching this Casino Royale is like sitting in a luxuriant art gallery, beholding works of great painters…right before you’re made to take a meter-long joint…and before watching some of those painters appear dance the can-can for no apparent reason while going ‘blblblblblblblblbl’ with their lips. That is the essence of the cinematic experience provided here. Oh it’s unique in it’s own way, oh it’s interesting for how bizarre it is, but I can’t in honestly say it’ll leave you with feelings beyond ‘well that happened’. Perhaps still if any of that strangeness intrigues you it might just be worth a semi-tipsy one-off watch—but only once.
Still, this isn’t even the only non-mainline oddball Bond spinoff there is, thank you Never Say Never. And honestly, I might even prefer this one. At least it wasn’t just remaking the same movie again but dumber…but that’s enough of that. I’d say I’d watch Dr. Strangelove as a way better Peter Sellers movie to get rid of the hangover from this one, but honestly, I doubt anything would do it…
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