James Bond 007: Casino Royale Script

Starring: Simon Abkarian, Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Giancarlo Giannini , Eva Green, Tobias Menzies, Mads Mikkelsen, Ivana Milicevic, Caterina Murino , Ludger Pistor, Claudio Santamaria, Clemens Schik, Jeffrey Wright
Screenplay: Paul Haggis, Neal Purvis, Robert Wade
Director(s): Martin Campbell

MPAA Rating: Unavailable

Reviewed by: El Mayimbe - 02.10.06


CASINO ROYALE
Screenplay by Neal Purvis and Robert Wade
Second set of revisions by Paul Haggis
December 13, 2005
Issued to Production Dec 20, 2005
Based on a novel by Ian Fleming
112 pages

Yo! The 800-pound gorilla script overlord EL MAYIMBE here with another big script!

Yes folks, Latinoreview has the CASINO ROYALE script! I had to pull some James Bond type of moves myself to get a hold of this script.

We debuted the reintroduction of Batman in Batman Begins two years ago for the Super Bowl XXXIX. I wanted to debut the re-introduction of James Bond in Casino Royale this past Sunday for another Super Bowl sized script review but I guess I am really on Latin time because I am a week late. Then again, I got the script days after the Super Bowl so better late than never. A million folks will look at this script review so what to say, what to say…

Let's get to it. For preview purposes we are going to take a look at the 1st act, which runs the first 39 pages and is the most action packed. Three big action pieces before the close of Act 1 because most of Act II is the casino action.

SPOLIER WARNING! IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW JACK ABOUT THE FILM NOR ACT I THEN STOP READING!

The script is really cool. An origin story. For starters the story is contemporized. The story does not take place during the cold war. The 1st 4 pages before the main title sequence shows us how James Bond got his double O ranking - his 1st two kills of MI6 Section Chief DRYDEN (for selling secrets) and Dryden's contact in Lahore, Pakistan FISHER. James catches up with Fisher in a Crickett Ground rest room. James has no kills and to get your Double O it takes two kills.

The MAIN TITLE sequence is the following - photos from Bond's CV, including his stint in the SAS, intercut with a high printing press. The sequence ends with crime scene photos of the two killings, Dryden and Fisher. After each killing, Bond's ID Badge is stamped with a 0 - until it is laminated as 007. A hand places the ID badge in the folder with the photos and the unseen clerk carries it off into the bowels of MI6.

Next we are in a jungle camp in Gulu, Uganda and meet STEVEN OBANNO, feared leader of the Lord's Resistance army. He hooks up with a man with gold-rimmed glasses simply known as MR. WHITE. Mr. White introduces Obanno to LE CHIFFRE who pulls up in three SUVS. Le Chiffre has provided reliable banking services for many other freedom fighters over the years. Obanno wants no risk in the portfolio and Le Chiffre agrees. Obanno gives Le Chiffre three metal boxes of money. Obanno wants to know if can access his money anywhere in the world. Le Chiffre takes a hit from an inhaler, gives Obano a business card and tells Obanno he has locations at most major airports. In this scene we also meet VALENKA, Le Chiffre's beautiful bodyguard.

Next, on page 7 we catch up with Bond and his teammate CARTER at a commune in Madagascar watching a fight to the death between a cobra and a mongoose. They are tailing BOMBER who is in the crowd watching the fight. The cover is blown and a multiple page chase scene ensues at a construction site, which spills over into the Nambutu embassy. One of the things I hate as a reader of screenplays is when I read thick dense chunks of description. Haggis' descriptions of action scenes go for 10 up to 18 lines! Huge ass paragraphs. If I were doing coverage on this script, I would discipline the writer. Once a writer gets successful though, he goes back to bad old habits. One of the gems of SHOOT' EM UP is that the action and description where no more than one line two lines tops! That writer broke up the action.

A note to the Mr. Haggis:

Mr. Haggis, you're Oscar nominated, the man and all but breakup the action every 4 lines or so please. Easier on the eyes and the reader. Don't be lazy. This is a screenplay not a novel. Thanks buddy! Loved Crash!

Back to the chase scene:

Bond blows Bomber away and gets caught on a security camera doing so! Bond is a little sloppy. He takes Bomber's wallet a finds a playing card ripped in half - the Queen of Hearts. On the dead guy's cell phone he reads a text message - "Ellipsis."

Next, Le Chiffre hosts a high stakes poker game on his yacht. KRATT, Le Chiffre's dangerous looking henchman approaches and whispers in Le Chiffre's ear. Le Chiffre is pissed. He goes into his bedroom and logs on to CNN.com on his laptop. Ellipsis expires in 36 hours. Just before Le Chiffre closes the laptop we see the headline: "British Agent Executes Embassy Employee", accompanied by a blurry high angle photo of Bond firing his weapon.

Back at a London newsstand, more shots of newspaper headlines, "Our Secret Murder Squad" with the security camera angles of Bond shooting and killing Bomber. Another stack of newspapers comes into frame: "MI6 kills Unarmed Prisoner." We rise up to see The House of Parliament.

Inside a private corridor in the House of Commons, M (Judi Dench) strides out with her aide, VILLIERS. He has never seen her this pissed. The words fly out of her mouth. M is like how could Bond be so stupid?! She gives him Double O status and he celebrates by shooting up an embassy? Is the man deranged? And where the hell is he? In the old days if an agent did something so embarrassing he'd have the good sense to defect. She misses the Cold War.

Where is Bond?

He breaks into M's house!

We almost find out what M's name is. She threatens to kill him if he utters another syllable. He uses her laptop at home to do a trace on the sim card from the cell phone of the Bomber that Bond called. They argue. Bond is an arrogant prick in this script and full of ego. She reads him the riot act on being a secret agent and all. He leaves.

Next we are in Nassau, Grand Bahama Island. Here is where we learn how Bond gets that Aston Martin of his. He tails a man DIMITRIOS and his wife SOLANGE. Bond looks up Dimitrios on a secure website. Alex Dimitrios, officially listed as a government contractor in Iraq, Afghanistan, Chechneya, Rwanda, Nicaragua, El Salvador, going back to the 70s. Dealer in arms, information, ties to death squads and right wing paramilitary groups.

What is cool is that Bond logs on to the secure website using M's password! Back in London, M's is made aware of this as she is awaken from her sleep by Villiers (M's aide). Bond also looks up known associates. An old photo of Le Chiffre appears who was supposedly executed in Iraq in 1998.

Bond beats Dimitrios at the One and Only Country club. Gee, I wonder what car Bond won in the game? Bond takes his new car, pulls up to the valet and drives his Dimitrios wife, Solange home. Bond has a thing for married women because it keeps things simple.

Bond follows Dimitrios to Miami. Bond steals his cell phone and gets into it with a bad guy named CARLOS. A huge action set piece occurs here for the next couple of pages on the tarmac at Miami airport that climaxes on page 35. I won't spoil it here. It's really cool and worth waiting for. Really huge action scene. The result of this scene causes Le Chiffre to lose one hundred and one million, two hundred and six thousand dollars.

Bond goes back to Dimitrios house where he hooks up with M. A MI6 CSI team combs the crime scene. Solange is dead. Bond gets a tracer installed into the back of his wrist so that MI6 can track him at all times. We find out that Dimitrios worked as a middleman, always knew how to put his hands on weapons and people who could use them. Worked with anyone who had the money. For years, he was tied to a man known as Le Chiffre, private banker to terrorists and organized crime. He invested their money and gave them access to it whenever they needed it. Saddam took a disliking to him after Desert Storm and cut off his head. M believes Le Chiffre is Albanian. A chess prodigy bit of a mathematical genius. Loved to prove it by playing poker. When they analyzed the stock market after 9/11 the CIA discovered there had been massive shorting of airline stocks. When the stocks hit bottom on 9/12, somebody made a fortune.

The same thing happened that morning with the Boeing stock, or was supposed to. With their prototype destroyed the company would have been near bankruptcy. Instead, someone lost over a hundred million dollars betting the wrong way. Mr. Le Chiffre isn't quite as dead as he should be, which would explain how he was able to set up a high stakes poker game at Casino Royale in Montenegro. Ten players, ten million dollar buy-in, five million re-buy. Winner-takes-all. Potentially a hundred and fifty million. M wants Le Chiffre alive. Le Chiffre doesn't have 100 million to lose; he was playing the market with his clients' funds and the client's won't like it when they find out it's gone.

If Le Chiffre loses this game, he will have nowhere to run. M will give him sanctuary for everything he knows. She is putting Bond in the game, replacing someone playing for a syndicate. According to Villiers, Bond is the best player in the service. M wishes that wasn't the case…

…and that folks is the set up for Casino Royale.

On page 39, the start of Act II, the crossing of the first threshold scene on a train is where Bond meets VESPER LYND who works for the treasury department. She puts Bond in his place and the use of exposition here in this scene is very clever. We find out more personal information about Bond in this scene in regards to his upbringing and background.

For those of you fanatics who must know and I am going to say it here - yes - the carpet beater scene is in here. Very painful to read. For those of you who didn't read the novel - James Bond is tortured and they go to work on a body part only men have. Ouch! The filmmakers have balls (no pun intended) to include this. Kudos to Campbell and Haggis for keeping it in there.

This story shows us why James Bond is the way he is, the chip on his shoulder, and the origins of the super secret agent to be. For sure, the edgiest of the Bond films because this is Bond at his most edgy. For sure, the Bond that Fleming intended and the fans have clamored to see.

Overall, a fantastic read and quite the origin story although contemporized, which may piss off some fans but for me the story works because the cold war is over after all. I have a feeling that if Ian Fleming were alive, he would contemporize the story also to go with today's times. As of this writing, they still haven't cast the part of Vesper and Le Chiffre. They are probably shooting the big action set pieces and chase scenes from Act I that don't require either Vesper or Le Chiffre.

There ya have it folks. Another look at a huge script from the net's most consistent script reviewer. Continue to count on Latinoreview for the scripts of the biggest upcoming Hollywood films.

Also we just got word that D.B. Weiss, the writer of the excellent spec script KASHMIR, which was one of my top 5 scripts of 2004 is rewriting HALO. Expect an official announcement soon. If you can get your hands on Kashmir then read it. Fucking awesome action drama script that centers on three ex-soldiers who get a hot tip and embark on a hunt for the world's most wanted man -- a terrorist with a $50 million bounty on his head. We might do a script review of it because it is one of the best un-produced spec scripts out there. I hope Warners grows the cojones to make the film.
credit to latinoreview