Seven James Bonds at Casino Royale,
They came to save the world and win a gal at Casino Royale.
Six of them went to a heavenly spot.
The seventh one is going to a place where it's terribly hot.
Song from Casino Royale


Long before Cubby Broccoli took an interest in Ian Fleming's spy hero, James Bond, one Fleming novel, Casino Royale, was given a rather shabby television rendition in 1952, as part of the anthology series Climax, with American actor Barry Nelson incongruously cast as the British spy and the great Peter Lorre as the villain. Producer Charles K. Feldman saw the program and bought up the rights to the novel, mostly on speculation.

Historical Background: Feldman, who was actually born Charles Gould on April 26th, 1904 in New York City, had been orphaned as a child and was raised by adoptive parents. He studied law and practiced for a while in Los Angeles, but in 1932 took the job of president of Famous Artists, a leading talent agency serving top Hollywood producers, directors, and actors. Then, in the early forties, Feldman turned to producing films. His first film as producer was Pittsburgh (1942). Some of the more notable films he produced or co-produced included Follow the Boys (1944), The Glass Menagerie (1950), A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), The Seven Year Itch (1955), Walk on the Wild Side (1962), and What's New Pussycat? (1965). By the time Feldman got around to thinking about a film based on Casino Royale, Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman had made James Bond 007 a household name associated with Sean Connery. The first four Bond films with Connery had already been released and the fifth, You Only Live Twice (1967), was filmed concurrently with Casino Royale. Feldman initially wanted to do his Bond film straight but had no luck talking Broccoli into loaning him Sean Connery for the project. He then decided to do the film as a parody.

What happened next was rather amazing. Feldman had a massive budget for the project, in the neighborhood of $6 million. Feldman first hired three screenwriters, Wolf Mankowitz, John Law, and Michael Sayers. Later, numerous lines provided by Woody Allen, Val Guest, Ben Hecht, Joseph Heller, Terry Southern, Billy Wilder, and Peter Sellers were appended. More remarkably, Feldman hired five separate directors, each to provide a portion of the film. They were Val Guest, Ken Hughes, John Huston, Joseph McGrath, and Robert Parrish. Each segment also had a different main character. As later explained by one of the five, Val Guest, Feldman simply turned the five directors loose with instructions to shoot their various pieces of the script, with no coordination among them. The only stylistic guidance provided was that each segment should have a "psychedelic" look, meaning, roughly, "senseless farce with glitzy visuals." The five segments were then stitched together, mainly by Val Guest, and given a wildly surreal ending to wrap it all up. Three different studios were used. The result was a pastiche of lunacy that goes beyond mere parody. Casino Royale isn't simply a parody of spy thrillers, it's a parody of the parodies. It's a chaotic, incoherent mess of a film that has nevertheless achieved cult status among those who can kick back and drink in absurdity as though it were a martini, shaken not stirred. It's probably one of those films best watched when the viewer is stoned.

The Story: Most reviews for this film studiously avoid trying to describe the plot. For one thing, it's not easy to follow, on a first watching. I've seen this film perhaps five times over a period of twenty years or so. Around the third time, it started to sink in. In the opening segment, Sir James Bond (David Niven) is a former spy living in peaceful retirement on a fine estate, guarded by a pride of lions. He tends to his garden, which boasts a prize black rose – "as black as a raven's wing at midnight." This Bond is remarkably different than the virile, womanizing, wisecracking Bond of the Broccoli series. In fact, he resents the younger generation of spies, especially the one named James Bond 007 after himself, who has made the term "secret agent" synonymous with "sex maniac." The Bond of this film even has a stutter. After a slew of British, Russian, French, and American secret agents are assassinated by the evil S.M.E.R.S.H., representatives from the four major intelligence agencies join together to pay a call on Sir James, to beg him to come out of retirement to save the intelligence community. M (John Huston) is there on behalf of MI5, Ransome (William Holden) for the CIA, Smernov (Kurt Kasznar) representing the KGB, and Le Grand (Charles Boyer) for the French. Bond adamantly refuses, even when presented with a personal request from the Queen. He's done his bit for Queen and country and now prefers idle retirement. Bond's refusal forces M to resort to a desperate measure. He signals a mortar squad posted nearby to demolish Bond's estate. M is killed in the process and Bond is forced out of retirement to take over as head of MI5.

The first order of business for Sir James is to pay his respects to M's widow in Scotland, Lady Fiona McTarry. By the time Bond gets there, however, the McTarry estate is swarming with S.M.E.R.S.H. agents, consisting of a bevy of beautiful young women. Agent Mimi (Deborah Kerr) is masquerading as the bereaved widow and the rest as the eleven McTarry daughters, all aged 16-19! Apparently, some were adopted! Their assignment is to destroy James Bond's reputation – his morals, his vows, and his celibate image. Failing that, they are to kill him. Two of the prettiest, Heather (Tracey Crisp) and Meg (Alexandra Bastedo), take a shot at seducing Sir James, while one of the youngest, Buttercup (Angela Scoular), offers to be his "little thermometer" and test his bathwater for him. Agent Mimi claims her widow's due. "Comfort me, Jamie," she demands. When he refuses, he's challenged to a wassle by five hulking Scottish pipers. After Sir James defeats the five he-men, Mimi falls in love with him. During the grouse shoot the next day, Bond comes under attack by remote controlled drones, keyed to a homing device hidden in one of his shirt buttons. Mimi reveals the plot and Bond uses his garter belt as a slingshot to propel the button in the direction of the would-be assassins. Sir James makes his escape in an antique roadster – a far cry from the other Bond's Aston Martin. A blond in a Jaguar and a remote controlled Bedford van pursue Bond, farcically, but he gets away, as the van smashes into the Jaguar.

At MI5 headquarters, Bond takes charge, after the usual repartee with Miss Moneypenny – except that this is Miss Moneypenny's daughter (Barbara Bouchet). How times flies! The foppish Hadley (Derek Nimmo) is there to welcome Sir James as well and informs him about the many agents who have been liquidated, probably including even Sir James's own nephew, Jimmy Bond Jr. (Woody Allen), a.k.a. 007, who went before a firing squad in Central America. Q (Geoffrey Bayldon) gives James a tour of the laboratory where the agents are working on such skills as knocking themselves out cold with karate chops or killing themselves with backfiring pistols. Bond has a plan for countering S.M.E.R.S.H. First, all agents will be renamed "James Bond" to confuse the enemy. Second, since S.M.E.R.S.H. agents are mostly beautiful young women, MI5 will need to produce an AFSD – anti-female spy device. Moneypenny selects an especially virile young agent, Cooper (Terence Cooper), who has a black belt in Kama Sutra. The poor chap is subjected to intense seduction training by two-dozen young beauties to build up his resistance. One especially perfect female specimen, a new secret weapon called The Detainer (Daliah Lavi), a.k.a. 007, proves a particular challenge, but Cooper passes the test. Then, he too is renamed "James Bond 007."

One of the S.M.E.R.S.H. operatives is a man named Le Chiffre (Orson Welles), a gifted baccarat player as well as a magician. Bond enlists the help of the shady Vesper Lynd (Ursula Andress), under threat of collection of back taxes, to seduce Evelyn Tremble (Peter Sellers), author of a book on baccarat. The stunning Vesper invites the card shark to her bed to sign her copy of his book and to play dress-up games. Sellers, as Tremble, provides pretty convincing impersonations of both Hitler and Napoleon. When Vesper goes out for a few moments, a beautiful S.M.E.R.S.H. agent, Miss Goodthighs (Jacqueline Bisset), knocks on the door and soon has Tremble drugged, inducing a drug-muddled dream. When Vesper returns, she rouses him and gets him to agree to take on Le Chiffre at Casino Royale. Vesper and MI5 will stake him to the £100,000 required to ensure that his system will have time to work its magic. Vesper and Tremble are both renamed "007." That makes six 007's so far, if you've lost count.

S.M.E.R.S.H. is also operated a scam out of a daycare operation called "International Mother's Help." Sir James needs a woman to infiltrate the center and selects his own daughter – Mata Bond (Joanna Pettet) – for the job. It seems that Bond once had an affair with the notorious Mata Hara. In fact, it was he who had lured her across the border from Spain to France, where she was stood up before a firing squad and executed. Never mind that it happened around 1914! It was his betrayal of the love of his life that had driven the regretful Sir James into retirement. Sir James travels to India, where his daughter, whom Bond hasn't seen since he left her in an orphanage at age three, has grown into a beautiful young woman, worshiped there as the celestial virgin of the sacred alter. She dances an erotic number and then offers her father poppy tea. "Your monthly paychecks went for the analyst," she informs him.

Mata (a.k.a. 007 #7) is enlisted in spy training school – the same one where her mother had trained (and entertained the entire German army in her bed). It's a surreal kind of place run by two Nazi relics, the dominatrix-like Frau Hoffner (Anna Quayle) and the creepy, weasel-like Polo (Ronnie Corbett). Mata discovers that her commode is situated on a rotating panel, which conveniently spins around to provide access to a secret passageway. Soon, she is spying on an art auction, run by a S.M.E.R.S.H. agent (Vladek Sheybal), selling off pornographic art treasures to World War II vintage officers. Mata steals the art slides and triggers the school's "simulated battle program." All hell breaks loose. Mata is pursued, but manages to escape with the help of a blast of foam from a fire extinguisher and a British Foreign Officer (Bernard Cribbins), who doubles as a taxi driver.

Meanwhile, Tremble (a.k.a. 007) has entered France. His status as a secret agent goes to his head, momentarily, and he assaults a customs official. At Casino Royale, Le Chiffre entertains the casino crowd with a levitation routine. Tremble arrives, surveys his quarry for a bit from behind a one-way mirror, and then sits down at the baccarat table opposite Le Chiffre. When Le Chiffre mocks Tremble, Tremble replies, with vague mystery, "We mustn't forget that the beggar who is sitting in the market place is completely deaf in so much as listening to the song that is coming from the mocking bird is concerned." Tremble (alias Bond) ultimately wins, of course, but as he is exiting the Casino with his check, he finds that his partner, Vesper, has been snatched by S.M.E.R.S.H. agents. Tremble hops in a Lotus Formula 3 and pursues the kidnappers to the lair of Le Chiffre. There, Tremble is subjected to surreal mind torture by Le Chiffre, but Vesper intervenes, killing all the characters in the fantasy and, finally, Tremble as well. Meanwhile, a couple of S.M.E.R.S.H. thugs enter and execute Le Chiffre for using S.M.E.R.S.H. funds to support his compulsive gambling.

Meanwhile, Mata Bond is kidnapped by a knight on a horse and whisked into a waiting spaceship that has set down in Trafalgar Square. At MI5 headquarters, Mimi shows up in a habit, having joined a convent, and hands Sir James a note, which informs him that Mata has been taken to S.M.E.R.S.H. headquarters at Casino Royale. Bond charges in with his whole team, comprised of Cooper, Moneypenny, and The Detainer. They are subdued by S.M.E.R.S.H. agents, including the Scottish pipers, and are soon standing before the mysterious Dr. Noah. Dr. Noah, hidden behind a screen, shows off the robotic Sir James clone he's developed, but James disarms the robot and uses the gun to destroy Dr. Noah's shield. Dr. Noah is revealed to be none other than Sir James's own nephew, little Jimmy Bond. Jimmy is too intimidated by his uncle to even speak, but reveals his sinister plot in mime. The undersized Jimmy has developed a lethal bacillus that will make all the world's women beautiful and destroy every man taller than 4'6". Talk about being overwhelmed by feelings of sexual inferiority! Jimmy wants a world in which a short man can score with any girl.

Jimmy isolates himself in a room with The Detainer, who is strapped naked to a table. "Do I appear menacing," he asks. She laughs. The Detainer later pretends to take an interest in the pathetic Jimmy so he'll release her. Then, she laces his drink with one of his own devious pills, which creates 400 little explosions in the body before ultimately culminating in an atomic explosion. A hiccup accompanies each preliminary explosion, leading to final grand kaboom! The countdown has started. Sir James, Mata, Moneypenny, and Cooper escape into the Casino. Vesper Lynd shows up to double-cross Sir James, but the U.S. Cavalry arrives, thanks to CIA director Ransome. A massive brawl breaks out. Jimmy is still hiccupping away. Somebody releases a canister of laughing gas and turns on the bubble machine. A spinning roulette wheel flies through the air and explodes. Sir James dispatches S.M.E.R.S.H. agents left and right, with karate kicks from atop a pool table. Girls in gold paint appear, followed by a raiding party of American Indian paratroopers. A French Legionnaire (Jean Paul Belmondo) joins the battle royal(e) as well. As Jimmy Bond's hiccups count down to the fateful explosion, the Cavalry bugle sounds and the Native Americans perform a war dance. A trained seal appears wearing a 007 sign. Hiccup number three . . . number two . . . kaboom!! Cue song at the top of this review.

Production Values: With three principal scriptwriters and another seven lesser contributors for this film, one could hardly assert that the plot maintains coherency. Many of the scenes were initially improvised by the actors, after which the scriptwriters wrote scenarios around what the actors had developed. It's disjointed to an extent that would be fatal for any other kind of film, but this film survives that deficit by the very fact that the film rises and falls by its absurdity. It comes across like a series of skits, but there's enough wry humor throughout to keep it pleasing. More than a satire on spy thrillers, this film is a satire of the spy parody films that were popular during the sixties, mocking the hip style of the Swingin' Sixties in which London was immersed. Peopled with lots of marquee names but mostly old-school actors, this film can be viewed as poking fun at Hollywood's preoccupation with catering to the youth culture.

The visual production values for this film are first rate. Gratuitous violence and scantily-clad beauties abound everywhere. Columbia Pictures funded the film generously, allowing the art directors to construct magnificent sets and the cameramen to film the rest on location in London. Some of the sets encompass optical illusions and others are modeled on German expressionism. One major highlight of the film is a splendidly upbeat musical score courtesy of Burt Bacharach, featuring saxophones, brass, and timpani.

Charles Feldman's tenure as president of a talent agency is quite evident in the casting of this film. I don't honestly remember any film with as many big name stars as this one. There are perhaps twenty actors or actresses in this film who are easily recognized from their other work. One consequence of that concentration of talent was a plethora of ego problems during the film's shooting. Supposedly, Peter Sellers and Orson Welles were so incompatible that their scenes together had to be shot separately and then cobbled together. Sellers ultimately walked out on the film and his scenes had to be adjusted accordingly. Woody Allen complained that his scenes were shortened to accommodate Sellers. Still, it's an amazing cast.

The great Peter Sellers was famous for such films as The Ladykillers (1955), I'm All Right Jack (1959), Lolita (1962), Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), The Pink Panther (1964), What's New Pussycat? (1965), The Return of the Pink Panther (1975), Murder by Death (1976), and The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976). David Niven's great career included performances in Dodsworth (1936), The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), The Prisoner of Zenda (1937), The Dawn Patrol (1938), Wuthering Heights (1939), The Way Ahead (1944), Stairway to Heaven (1946), Around the World in 80 Days (1956), Separate Tables (1958), The Guns of Navarone (1961), The Pink Panther (1964), and Murder by Death (1976).

The angst-ridden Woody Allen was just starting out, but had already worked in What's New Pussycat? (1965) and What's Up, Tiger Lily? (1966). He went on to a long career as both actor and director. Orson Welles had a long career as both actor and director, appearing in such films as Citizen Kane (1941), Jane Eyre (1944), Lady from Shanghai (1948), The Black Rose (1950), Othello (1952), Moby Dick (1956), and A Man for All Seasons (1966), and directing such films as Citizen Kane (1941), The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), The Stranger (1946), The Lady from Shanghai (1948), Otello (1952), Touch of Evil (1958), The Trial (1963), and Chimes at Midnight (1966).

Jean-Paul Belmondo has only a bit part here, but was a famous French actor, appearing in such films as A Bout de Souffle (1959), A Woman is a Woman, My Life to Live (1962), Contempt (1963), The Married Woman (1964), Pierrot le Fou (1965) and Les Misérables (1995). Then there are such luminaries as William Holden (Picnic (1955) and The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)), Charles Boyer (Mayerling (1936) and The Earrings of Madame de . . . (1953)), John Huston (Chinatown (1974) and The Wind and the Lion (1975)), and Kurt Kasznar (Kiss Me Kate (1953) and The Last Time I Saw Paris (1954)).

One cute aspect of Casino Royale is the casting of three "crossover" performers from the Broccoli series of Bond films. Ursula Andress, who co-stars as Vesper Lynd, was the original Bond girl, in Dr. No (1962). Vladek Sheybal, who plays the auctioneer in the present film, was memorable as a SPECTRE agent in From Russian with Love (1963). Angela Scoular, who plays Buttercup in the present film, later appeared in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969).

Deborah Kerr's performance as Agent Mimi (a.k.a., Lady Fiona McTarry) is one of the best in the present film. She debuted in Major Barbara (1941) and appeared in such films as The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943) and Black Narcissus (1946). Barbara Bouchet, who plays Miss Moneypenny, was otherwise best known for Sweet Charity (1969). A couple of the best performances in Casino Royale were turned in by character actors, Anna Quayle (as Frau Hoffner) and Ronnie Corbett (as Polo). Jacqueline Bisset has a cameo as Miss Goodthighs.

Bottom-Line: The MGM DVD release for this film comes with a very nice package of extras. There's a very informative 20-minute behind-the-scenes documentary called "Psychedelic Cinema," featuring Val Guest. The DVD also includes the 1954 television version of Casino Royale which was actually the first ever appearance of James Bond on the screen. I will be reviewing that film separately, later in my cycle of Bond reviews.

I could just as easily argue that this film is an incoherent disaster or a masterpiece. In truth, some viewers will reach each of those two conclusions. The trick, then, is for viewers to anticipate which group they'll likely be in. I suspect that folks who enjoy the Mike Myers Austin Powers series, the Monty Python films (such as Monty Python and the Holy Grail and Monty Python's Life of Brian), or television programs like Saturday Night Live are likely to also enjoy Casino Royale (1967). You must have a willingness to suspend all requirements for basic sense. Casino Royale is like a party where everyone is intoxicated. Folks who take their Bond films seriously and, especially, those with a distaste for the Bond films that most indulge in self-spoofing (e.g., A View to a Kill) will probably not care for Casino Royale. I personally find it to be an imperfect treasure.

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You may also enjoy my other reviews for 007 films:

Casino Royale (1954), non-series, television
Dr. No (1962)
From Russia with Love (1963)
Goldfinger (1964)
Thunderball (1965)
You Only Live Twice (1967)
On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969)
Diamonds Are Forever (1971)
Live and Let Die (1973)
The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)
The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
Moonraker (1979)
For Your Eyes Only (1981)
Octopussy (1983)
Never Say Never Again (1983), non-series
A View to a Kill (1985)
The Living Daylights (1987)
Licence to Kill (1989)
GoldenEye (1995)
Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
The World Is Not Enough (1999)
Die Another Day (2002)

Recommended:
Yes

Video Occasion: Good for a Rainy Day
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older