James Bond 007 - 50 Years Homages

Skyfall - 2012

By Wikipedia
Skyfall is the twenty-third James Bond film produced by Eon Productions. It was distributed by MGM and Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2012. It features Daniel Craig's third performance as James Bond, and Javier Bardem as Raoul Silva, the film's antagonist. The film was directed by Sam Mendes and written by Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and John Logan.
The film centres on Bond investigating an attack on MI6; the attack is part of a plot by former MI6 operative Raoul Silva to humiliate, discredit and kill M as revenge against her for betraying him. The film sees the return of two recurring characters to the series after an absence of two films: Q, played by Ben Whishaw, and Eve Moneypenny, played by Naomie Harris. Skyfall is the last film of the series for Judi Dench, who played M, a role that she had played in the previous six films. The position is subsequently filled by Ralph Fiennes' character, Gareth Mallory.
Mendes was approached to direct the film after the release of Quantum of Solace in 2008. Development was suspended when MGM encountered financial troubles and did not resume until December 2010; during this time, Mendes remained attached to the project as a consultant. The original screenwriter, Peter Morgan, left the project during the suspension. When production resumed, Logan, Purvis, and Wade continued writing what became the final version of the script. Filming began in November 2011 and primarily took place in the United Kingdom, China and Turkey.
Skyfall premiered in London at the Royal Albert Hall on 23 October 2012 and was released in the United Kingdom on 26 October 2012 and the United States on 9 November 2012. It was the first James Bond film to be screened in IMAX venues, although it was not filmed with IMAX cameras. The film's release coincided with the 50th anniversary of the Bond series, which began with Dr. No in 1962. Skyfall was positively received by critics and at the box office, becoming the 14th film, as well as the first Bond film, to cross the $1 billion mark worldwide. As of March 2013, it is the seventh-highest-grossing film of all time, the highest-grossing film in the UK, the highest-grossing film in the Bond series, the highest-grossing film worldwide for both Sony Pictures and MGM, and the second-highest-grossing film of 2012. The film won several accolades, including the BAFTA Awards for Outstanding British Film and Best Film Music; the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Motion Picture; and was nominated for five Academy Awards, of which it won two: Per Hallberg and Karen Baker won the award for Best Sound Editing, and Adele's theme song won Best Original Song.

Plot:
In Istanbul, MI6 agents James Bond and Eve chase a mercenary, Patrice, who has stolen a computer hard drive containing details of undercover agents placed in terrorist organisations by NATO states. Patrice wounds Bond in the shoulder and, as the two men fight atop a train, Eve inadvertently shoots Bond, allowing Patrice to escape. Bond falls into a river and goes missing, and is presumed to be dead.
In the aftermath of the operation, M, the head of MI6, comes under political pressure to retire from Gareth Mallory, the Intelligence and Security CommitteeChairman. On her return from the meeting, MI6's servers are breached and M receives a taunting message via computer moments before the offices explode, killing a number of employees. MI6 relocates to its emergency offices underground. Bond, having used his supposed death to retire, learns of the attack and returns to London. Although he fails a series of physical and psychological examinations, M approves his return to the field. Shrapnel taken from Bond's shoulder wound helps identify Patrice, and intelligence places him in Shanghai, where he is planning an assassination. Bond is ordered to identify Patrice's employer, recover the stolen hard drive and kill Patrice.
After Patrice kills his target, he and Bond fight. Patrice falls to his death before Bond can learn of his employer. Searching Patrice's equipment, Bond finds a gambling chip intended as payment for the assassination, which leads him to a casino in Macau. Bond approaches Sévérine, whom he witnessed as an accomplice in the assassination, and asks to meet whoever she and Patrice work for. She warns him that he is about to be killed by her bodyguards, but promises to help Bond if he will kill her employer. Bond defeats his attackers and joins Sévérine on her boat. They travel to an abandoned island off the coast of Macau, where they are taken prisoner by the crew and delivered to Raoul Silva. A former MI6 officer who had previously worked under M, Silva has turned to cyberterrorism, orchestrating the attacks on MI6. Silva kills Sévérine, but Bond overpowers his guards and captures Silva for removal to Britain.
At MI6's underground headquarters, Q attempts to decrypt Silva's laptop, but inadvertently enables it to access the MI6 systems, allowing Silva to escape from MI6 custody. Realising Silva's capture was part of a plan to confront and kill M, Bond gives chase through the tunnel network under London. Silva attacks M during a public inquiry into her handling of the stolen hard drive. Bond arrives in time to join Mallory and Eve in repelling Silva's attack, and M is hurried from the building by her aide, Bill Tanner. Bond drives M to Skyfall, his family estate and childhood home in Scotland. Laying a trap, he instructs Q to leave an electronic trail for Silva to follow, a decision Mallory supports.
Bond and M are met by Kincade, the Skyfall gamekeeper. The trio are only lightly armed, but they improvise a series of booby traps throughout the house. When Silva's men arrive, Bond, M and Kincade fight off the assault, although M is wounded. Silva arrives by helicopter to lead a second assault, and Bond sends M and Kincade off through a secret tunnel at the back of a priest hole to a chapel on the grounds. The second assault is much heavier than the first, using incendiary grenades and a machine gun mounted on the helicopter. Bond detonates gas canisters with a stick of dynamite and retreats down the same tunnel as M and Kincade. The resulting blast causes the helicopter to crash, destroying the house and killing most of Silva's men. Silva survives and, spotting Kincade's torch beam, follows Kincade and M to the chapel. He forces his gun into M's hand, begging her to kill them both. Bond, having been delayed fighting Silva's henchmen, arrives and kills Silva, but M succumbs to her earlier wound and dies. Following M's funeral, Eve—formally introducing herself to Bond as Eve Moneypenny—retires from field work to become secretary for the new head of MI6, Mallory, who assumes the title of M.

Cast:
- Daniel Craig as James Bond, agent 007.
- Judi Dench as M, the head of MI6 and Bond's superior.
- Javier Bardem as Raoul Silva (born Tiago Rodriguez), the film's main antagonist.
- Ralph Fiennes as Gareth Mallory, Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee.
- Naomie Harris as Eve Moneypenny, an MI6 field agent.
- Bérénice Marlohe as Séverine, Raoul Silva's mistress.
- Albert Finney as Kincade, the gamekeeper of the Skyfall estate.
- Ben Whishaw as Q, the MI6 quartermaster.
- Rory Kinnear as Bill Tanner, the MI6 Chief of Staff.
- Ola Rapace as Patrice, a mercenary.

Production and Development:
Production of Skyfall was suspended throughout 2010 because of MGM's financial troubles. They resumed pre-production following MGM's exit from bankruptcy on 21 December 2010 and, in January 2011, the film was officially given a release date of 9 November 2012 by MGM and the Broccoli family, with production scheduled to start in late 2011. Subsequently MGM and Sony Pictures announced that the UK release date would be brought forward to 26 October 2012, two weeks ahead of the US release date, which remained scheduled for 9 November 2012. The film's budget is estimated to be between US$150 million and $200 million, compared to the $200 million spent on Quantum of Solace. Skyfall was part of year-long celebrations of the 50th anniversary of Dr. No and the Bond film series. According to producer Michael G. Wilson, a documentary crew was scheduled to follow production of the film to celebrate the anniversary.

Pre-production:
In August 2011 the Serbian newspaper Blic stated that Bond 23 would be entitled Carte Blanche and would be an adaptation of the recent continuation novel by Jeffery Deaver. On 30 August Eon Productions officially denied any link between Bond 23 and Carte Blanche, stating that "the new film is not going to be called Carte Blanche and will have nothing to do with the Jeffery Deaver book". On 3 October 2011 fifteen domain names including 'jamesbond-skyfall.com' and 'skyfallthefilm.com' were reported to have been registered on behalf of MGM and Sony Pictures by Internet brand-protection service MarkMonitor. This led to supposition in the media that the film had been given the name "Skyfall". These reports were not confirmed at the time by Eon Productions, Sony or MGM. Skyfall was later confirmed as the title at a press conference on 3 November 2011, during which co-producer Barbara Broccoli said that the title "has some emotional context which will be revealed in the film". The title refers to the name of Bond's childhood home "Skyfall", and the setting for the film's finale.

Casting:
The main cast of Skyfall was officially announced at a press conference held at the Corinthia Hotel in London on 3 November 2011, fifty years to the day since Sean Connery was announced to play James Bond in the film Dr. No. Daniel Craig returned as James Bond for the third time, saying he felt lucky to have the chance to appear as 007. Director Sam Mendes described Bond as experiencing a "combination of lassitude, boredom, depression [and] difficulty with what he's chosen to do for a living". Judi Dench returned as M for her seventh and final appearance in the role. Over the course of the film, M's ability to run MI6 is repeatedly called into question, culminating in a public inquiry into her running of the service. As the film's principal villain Javier Bardem was cast, playing a cyberterrorist who is seeking revenge against those he holds responsible for betraying him. Bardem described Silva as "more than a villain", while Craig stated that Bond has a "very important relationship" to Silva. In casting the role, director Sam Mendes admitted that he lobbied hard for Bardem to accept the part. Mendes saw the potential for the character to be recognised as one of the most memorable characters in the series and wanted to create "something [the audience] may consider to have been absent from the Bond movies for a long time". He felt that Bardem was one of the few actors up to the task of becoming "colourless" and existing within the world of the film as something more than a function of the plot. In preparing for the role, Bardem had the script translated into his native Spanish in order to better understand his character, which Mendes cited as being a sign of the actor's commitment to the film. Bardem dyed his hair blond for the role after brainstorming ideas with Mendes to come up with a distinct visual look for the character, which led some commentators to observe a similarity between the character and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
Ralph Fiennes was cast as Gareth Mallory, a former lieutenant colonel in the British Army and now the Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee, which gives him the authority to regulate MI6. At the end of the film, Mallory becomes the head of MI6, assuming the title of M. During production, Fiennes stated that he could not say anything specific about the role other than that it was a "really interesting part which is really quite fun". To play the returning character of Miss Moneypenny, Naomie Harris was cast. Harris' role was initially presented as that of Eve, an MI6 field agent who works closely with Bond. Despite ongoing speculation in the media that Harris had been cast as Miss Moneypenny, this was not confirmed by anyone involved in production of the film, with Harris herself even going so far as to dismiss claims that Eve was in fact Moneypenny, stating that "Eve is not remotely office-bound". According to Harris, Eve "[believes] she is Bond's equal, but she is really his junior". Another character returning to the series was Q, played by Ben Whishaw. Mendes had initially declined to confirm which part Whishaw would play, and later said the idea of the re-introduction was his, saying "I offered ideas about Moneypenny, Q and a flamboyant villain and they said yes". Bérénice Marlohe was cast as Séverine, a character who had been saved from the Macau sex trade by Silva and now works as his representative. Marlohe described her character as being "glamorous and enigmatic", and that she drew inspiration from GoldenEye villain Xenia Onatopp (played by Famke Janssen) in playing Séverine. To play the part of Kincade, Mendes cast Albert Finney. The producers briefly considered approaching Sean Connery to play the role in a nod to the 50th anniversary of the film series, but elected not to as they felt Connery's presence would be seen as stunt casting and disengage audiences from the film.

Crew:
Skyfall was directed by Sam Mendes, who first signed on to the project shortly after Quantum of Solace was released, and remained on board as a consultant during the period of uncertainty surrounding MGM's financial situation. Mendes, who had previously worked with Craig on Road to Perdition, was approached after seeing Craig in a production of A Steady Rain. The two met after a performance, where Craig broached the subject of directing a Bond film for the first time. Mendes was at first hesitant to accept the job as directing a Bond film had no appeal to him, but he did not reject the offer immediately because of Craig's involvement and enthusiasm for the project; Mendes described Craig's casting and performance in Casino Royale as being precisely what he felt the Bond franchise needed in its lead actor. He agreed to direct after meeting with producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli and seeing the early direction the film was going to take. Speculation in the media suggested that Mendes had commissioned rewrites of the script to "[remove] action scenes in favour of 'characterful performances'" with the intention of bidding for an Academy Award. Mendes denied the reports, stating that the film's planned action scenes were an important part of the overall film.
Peter Morgan was originally commissioned to write a script, but left the project when MGM filed for bankruptcy and production of the film stalled; despite his departure, Morgan later stated that the final script was based on his original idea, retaining what he described as the film's "big hook". Director Mendes adamantly denied this, stating that it was "just not true" and that Morgan's script treatment had been discarded once Mendes agreed to direct. The final script was written by Bond screenwriting regulars Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and John Logan. Logan recounted being brought into the project by his long-time friend Sam Mendes, describing the process between Mendes and the writers as "very collaborative", and that writing Skyfall was one of the best experiences he had had in scripting a film.
Roger Deakins signed on as cinematographer, having previously worked with Mendes on Jarhead and Revolutionary Road. Dennis Gassner returned as production designer, the costume designer was Jany Temime, Alexander Witt was director of the second unit, the stunt co-ordinator was Gary Powell and Chris Corbould supervised the special effects, while the visual effects supervisor was Steve Begg. All have worked on previous Bond films. Daniel Kleinman returned to design the film's title sequence after stepping aside to allow graphic design studio MK12 to create the Quantum of Solace sequence.

Location scouting:
Sam Mendes and Barbara Broccoli travelled to South Africa for location scouting in April 2011. With the film moving into pre-production in August, reports emerged that shooting would take place in India, with scenes to be shot in the Sarojini Nagar district of New Delhi and on railway lines between Goa and Ahmedabad. The production crew faced complications in securing permission to close sections of the Konkan Railway. Similar problems in obtaining filming permits were encountered by production crews for The Dark Knight Rises and Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol. Permission was eventually granted to the Bond production crew; however, the production ultimately did not shoot in India.

Filming:
Principal photography was scheduled to take up 133 days, although the actual filming took 128. Filming began on 7 November 2011 in and around London, with the cinematographer Roger Deakins using Arri Alexa cameras to shoot the entire film. Scenes were shot in London Underground stations, Smithfield car park in West Smithfield, the National Gallery, Southwark, Whitehall, Parliament Square, Charing Cross station the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, Cadogan Square and Tower Hill. St Bartholomew's Hospital was used as the filming location for the scene in which Bond enters MI6's underground headquarters, while the Old Vic Tunnels underneath Waterloo Station in London served as the MI6 training grounds. For the meeting between Q and Bond, production worked during the National Gallery's closing hours at night. The Department of Energy and Climate Change was used in the scene when Bond stood on the roof near the end of the film. TheVauxhall Bridge and Millbank was closed to traffic for filming the explosion at the MI6 headquarters at Vauxhall Cross. Unlike The World Is Not Enough, which also featured an explosion at the building—which was filmed at a large-scale replica—the explosion in Skyfall was added digitally in post-production. Shooting of the finale was planned to take place at Duntrune Castle in Argyll, but was cancelled shortly after filming began. Glencoe was instead chosen for filming of these scenes. Although supposedly based in Scotland, Bond's family home of Skyfall was constructed on Hankley Common in Surrey using plywood and plaster to build a full-scale model of the building.

Production moved to Turkey in March 2012, with filming reported to be continuing until 6 May. Production was expected to take three months in the country. Adana stands in for the outskirts of Istanbul in the film. A group of Turkish teenagers infiltrated a closed set in a railway sidings in Adana to film rehearsals of a fight scene on top of a train before being caught by security. The train scene depicted in trailers showed the Varda Viaduct outside of Adana. Bond stunt double, Andy Lister, dived backwards off the 300 foot drop for the scene. A crane was set up on a train carriage to hold a safety line. Parts of Istanbul — including the Spice Bazaar, Yeni Camii, the Main Post Office, Sultanahmet Square and the Grand Bazaar — were closed for filming in April. Store owners in the affected areas were reportedly allowed to open their shops, but were not allowed to conduct business, instead being paid TRY750 ($418) per day as compensation. Production faced criticism for allegedly damaging buildings while filming a motorcycle chase across rooftops in the city. Michael G. Wilson denied these claims, pointing out that the film crew had removed sections of rooftops before filming began and replaced them with replicas for the duration of the shoot; when filming finished, the original rooftops would be restored. The production team negotiated with 613 part owners of the Calis Beach in Fethiye, to film along the coastline.
Mendes confirmed that China would be featured in the film, with shooting scheduled to take place in Shanghai and "other parts" of the country. John Logan described that production deliberately sought out locations that were "in opposition" to London with an exotic quality that made them "places for Bond to be uncomfortable". Many scenes were not filmed on location in Shanghai. Instead, the Virgin Active Pool in London's Canary Wharf acted as Bond's hotel pool in Shanghai, and the entrance to London's fourth tallest building, Broadgate Tower, was also lit up to look like an office building there; for the aerial footage of Shanghai, the crew received rare access to shoot from a helicopter on loan from the Chinese government. The interior of the Golden Dragon Casino in Macau where Bond met Sévérine was constructed on a sound stage at Pinewood, with 300 floating lanterns and two 30-foot high dragon heads lighting the set. Additional scenes were filmed at Ascot Racecourse, standing in for Shanghai Pudong International Airport. The first official image from the film was released on 1 February 2012, showing Daniel Craig on set at Pinewood Studios, within a recreation of a skyscraper in Shanghai.
Set reports dated April 2012 recorded that scenes would be set on Hashima Island, an abandoned island off the coast of Nagasaki, Japan. In actuality, the scene was set on an unnamed island off the coast of Macau, though based on the real-life Hashima. Sam Mendes explained that the location was a hybrid of a set and computer-generated images. Production chose to include the Hashima model after Daniel Craig met with Swedish film-maker Thomas Nordanstad whilst shooting The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo in Stockholm. Nordanstad, who produced a short documentary on Hashima Island in 2002 entitled Hashima, recalled Craig taking extensive notes on the island at the time of the meeting, but was unaware of his interest in it until Skyfall was released.
The film was later converted into the IMAX format for projection in IMAX cinemas. Deakins was unaware that the film was to be released on IMAX until after he had made the decision to shoot the film with the Arri Alexa cameras, and was unhappy with the IMAX tests made from his footage as the colours "didn't look great". After exploring the IMAX system further and discovering that the IMAX Corporation was using their proprietary re-mastering process, Deakins had further tests made without the process and found that "the images looked spectacular on the big IMAX screen", quelling his doubts about the format.

Music:

Thomas Newman, who worked with Sam Mendes as composer for American Beauty, Road to Perdition, Jarhead and Revolutionary Road, replaced David Arnold as composer, becoming the ninth composer in the series' history. When asked about the circumstances surrounding his departure from the role, David Arnold commented that Newman had been selected by Mendes because of their work together, rather than because of Arnold's commitment to working with director Danny Boyle as composer for the Opening Ceremony of the 2012 Summer Olympics. The soundtrack album was released on 29 October 2012 in the United Kingdom and on 6 November 2012 in the United States.
The film also features Charles Trenet's 1938 song Boum ! during scenes in which Silva shows Bond around his abandoned island, and The Animals' 1964 cover of John Lee Hooker's Boom Boom when Silva assaults Skyfall in the film's finale.
In October 2012 British singer-songwriter Adele confirmed that she had written and recorded the film's theme song with her regular songwriter, Paul Epworth. She later posted the cover for the "Skyfall" sheet music on Twitter, crediting the songwriting to herself and Epworth, with arrangements to both Epworth and orchestrator J. A. C. Redford. The song was released online at 0:07 am BST on 5 October 2012, a day dubbed "James Bond Day" by the producers as it marked fifty years to the day of the release of Dr. No.
The song was nominated for and won the Academy Award for Best Original Song. It was the first time a Bond song had won, and only the fourth time one had been nominated. "Skyfall" also won the Brit Award for Best British Single at the 2013 BRIT Awards.

Release and reception:
The premiere of Skyfall was on 23 October 2012 at the Royal Albert Hall in London. The event was attended by Charles, Prince of Wales, and his wife Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. The film was released in the UK three days later on 26 October and into US cinemas on 8 November. Skyfall was the first Bond film to be screened in IMAX venues and was released into IMAX cinemas in North America a day earlier than the conventional cinema release.
Skyfall attracted some criticism from the National Sexual Violence Resource Center which, without having screened the film, expressed concern that Bond "abuses his power and authority" in a scene that suggests Bond initiates sexual intercourse with Sévérine, a former victim of sex trafficking.

Box office:
Skyfall has earned $1.1 billion worldwide, and is the highest-grossing film worldwide for Sony Pictures, the second-highest-grossing film of 2012, and the seventh-highest-grossing film of all time. On its opening weekend, it earned $80.6 million from 25 markets. In the UK the film grossed £20.1 million on its opening weekend, making it the second-highest Friday-to-Sunday debut ever behind Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2. It also achieved the second-highest IMAX debut ever behind The Dark Knight Rises. The film set a record for the highest seven-day gross with £37.2 million, surpassing previous record holder Deathly Hallows – Part 2 (£35.7 million). By 9 November 2012 the film had earned over £57 million to surpass The Dark Knight Rises as the highest-grossing film of 2012, and the highest-grossing James Bond film of all time in the UK. After 40 days of release the total UK gross stood at £94.28 million, making Skyfall the highest-grossing film in the UK, surpassing the £94.03 million of Avatar. By 30 December 2012, it became the first film to gross more than £100 million ($161.6 million) in the UK.
Skyfall set an opening weekend record in Switzerland ($5.3 million) and recorded the second-largest opening weekend for a Hollywood film in India ($5.1 million), as well as grossing $14.3 million on its opening weekend in France. In Austria, it achieved the second-highest opening weekend ever ($3.4 million) behind The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, while in Finland, it scored the largest opening weekend when excluding previews ($1.47 million).
In North America, the film opened in 3,505 cinemas, the widest opening for a Bond film. The film earned $2.4 million from midnight showings on its opening day and a further $2.2 million from IMAX and large-format cinemas. CinemaScore polls reported that the average grade filmgoers gave the film was an "A" on an A+ to F scale. Skyfall went on to gross $30.8 million on its opening day in the US and Canada, and $88.4 million in its opening weekend, the biggest debut yet for a Bond film. As of March 2013, it has so far grossed $304.3 million in the United States and Canada, making it the fourth highest-grossing film of 2012 in these regions.

Critical reception:
Skyfall received generally positive reviews from critics; Rotten Tomatoes sampled 288 reviewers and judged 92% of the reviews to be positive, while the film scored of 81 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 43 reviews. A number of critics, including Kate Muir, reviewing for The Times, Philip French, writing in The Observer, IGN's Daniel Krupa and the reviewers for the Irish Independent and the Daily Record, all asked whether Skyfall was the best Bond film produced. The Daily Telegraph's film reviewer, Robbie Collin, considered Skyfall to be "often dazzling, always audacious", with excellent action sequences in a film that contained humour and emotion. Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter thought that Skyfall was "dramatically gripping while still brandishing a droll undercurrent of humor", going on to say that it was a film that had "some weight and complexity to it". Variety's Peter DeBruge suggested that the film's greatest strength lay in its willingness to put as much focus on characterisation as it did action set-pieces, allowing the two to co-exist rather than compete for the audience's attention, while Manohla Dargis, reviewing for The New York Times, considered Skyfall to be "a superior follow-up to Casino Royale" which is "opulent rather than outlandish and insistently, progressively low-key". Kim Newman, reviewing the film for Empire, concluded, "Skyfallis pretty much all you could want from a 21st Century Bond: cool but not camp, respectful of tradition but up to the moment, serious in its thrills and relatively complex in its characters but with the sense of fun that hasn't always been evident lately". Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film 4 out of 4 stars, describing it as "a full-blooded, joyous, intelligent celebration of a beloved cultural icon". Reviewing for the New Statesman, Ryan Gilbey saw that "nostalgia permeates the movie", going on to say that "sometimes the old ways are the best".
A number of reviewers praised Daniel Craig in Skyfall. Roger Ebert believed that in Skyfall "Daniel Craig [takes] full possession of a role he previously played unconvincingly"; Philip French commented that "Craig manages to get out of the shadow of Connery"; while Daniel Krupa thought Craig's Bond was a "defining performance" for "a great actor". Edward Porter, writing in The Sunday Times, considered that "Craig has developed an authoritative Bond persona, dry and intelligent". Ryan Gilbey thought Craig had "relaxed into Bond without losing any steeliness".
The supporting cast also received praise. Roger Ebert reflected that Skyfall "at last provides a role worthy of Judi Dench, one of the best actors of her generation. She is all but the co-star of the film, with a lot of screen time, poignant dialogue, and a character who is far more complex and sympathetic than we expect in this series". Jenny McCartney, writing in The Sunday Telegraph, agreed, describing Dench as "compellingly luminous" in the film, and the one that "the camera caresses most meaningfully and often". McCartney thought Javier Bardem played Silva "with worrisome élan", while Henry K Miller considered his character "the most authentically Bondian Bond villain in decades". A number of critics noted the strength of the supporting cast; Kim Newman found the "warmth and gravitas" of Finney's performance noteworthy, while other reviewers, including Edward Porter, Daniel Krupa and The Playlist's Oliver Lyttelton, singled out Ralph Fiennes as Mallory and Ben Whishaw as Q.
Ann Hornaday, writing for The Washington Post, thought Sam Mendes had reinvigorated the series, with Skyfall being "sleek, crisp, classy ... exhibiting just the right proportion of respect for legacy and embrace of novelty". Henry K. Miller of Sight & Sound agreed, and praised Mendes, who he thought was worthy of directing more Bond films. Kim Newman also praised Mendes' direction of the action sequences. The work of cinematographer Roger Deakins also received praise: Newman commented that he "delivers the most impressive visuals this series has had since the 1960s", and Miller described the film as "dazzlingly photographed".
The film did not escape criticism, with reviews pointing to its two and a half-hour running time, and the final third of the film being "protracted", and not matching the first two thirds in its momentum as the underlying flaws in the film. Xan Brooks of The Guardian, in an otherwise positive review, criticised the "touchy-feely indulgence" of "the bold decision to open Bond up – to probe at the character's back-story and raise a toast to his relationship with M". Daniel Krupa also singled out Naomie Harris as "awkward" and having a "virtually non-existent chemistry" with Daniel Craig. Similarly Philip French in The Observer tempered his praise for the film by highlighting "some lazy repetition" and argued, "the badinage is often perfunctory and Bond is as usual captured too easily and too easily escapes". Edward Porter, writing in The Sunday Times, considered that while aspects of the film were "achieved with wit and panache", he found that the climax to the film was slightly disappointing, although the "weaknesses in the final stages are not serious, however, and the film's brief epilogue is wonderful".

Home media:
Skyfall was released on DVD and Blu-ray in the U.S. on 12 February 2013, and in the UK on 18 February.

Quantum of Solace - 2008

By Wikipedia
Quantum of Solace (2008) is the twenty-second James Bond film produced by Eon Productions, and is the direct sequel to the 2006 film Casino Royale. Directed by Marc Forster, it features Daniel Craig's second performance as James Bond. In the film, Bond battles wealthy businessman Dominic Greene (Mathieu Amalric), a member of the Quantum organisation, posing as an environmentalist who intends to stage a coup d'état in Bolivia to seize control of the nation's water supply. Bond also seeks revenge for the death of his lover, Vesper Lynd (Eva Green), and is assisted by Camille Montes (Olga Kurylenko), who is seeking revenge for the murder of her family.
Producer Michael G. Wilson developed the film's plot while Casino Royale was being shot. Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, Paul Haggis, and Joshua Zetumer contributed to the script, Daniel Craig and Marc Forster had to write some sections themselves due to the Writers Strike, though they were not given the screenwriter credit in the final cut. The title was chosen from a 1959 short story in Ian Fleming's For Your Eyes Only, though the film does not contain any elements of the original story. Location filming took place in Mexico, Panama, Chile, Italy, Austria, and Wales while interior sets were built and filmed at Pinewood Studios. Forster aimed to make a modern film that also featured classic cinema motifs: a vintage Douglas DC-3 was used for a flight sequence, and Dennis Gassner's set designs are reminiscent of Ken Adam's work on several early Bond films. Taking a course away from the usual Bond villains, Forster rejected any grotesque appearance for the character Dominic Greene to emphasise the hidden and secret nature of the film's contemporary villains.
The film was also marked by its frequent depictions of violence, with a 2012 study by the University of Otago in New Zealand finding it to be the most violent film in the franchise. Whereas Dr No featured 109 "trivial or severely violent" acts, by the time Quantum of Solace was released, the count grew to 250 - the most depictions of violence in any Bond film.
The film premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square on 29 October 2008, gathering mixed reviews which mainly praised Craig's gritty performance and the film's action sequences while feeling that Quantum of Solace was not as impressive as the predecessor Casino Royale. As of November 2012, it is the third-highest-grossing James Bond film, without adjusting for inflation, earning $586 million worldwide.

Plot:
James Bond is driving from Lago di Garda to Siena, Italy, with the captured Mr. White in the boot of his car. After evading pursuers, Bond and M interrogate White regarding his organisation, Quantum. M's bodyguard, Mitchell, a double agent, attacks M, enabling White to escape. Bond chases Mitchell and kills him. Bond and M return to London and search Mitchell's flat, discovering through tagged banknotes that Mitchell had a contact in Haiti. Bond tracks the contact, Edmund Slate, and learns that Slate is a hitman sent to kill Camille Montes at the behest of her lover, environmentalist Dominic Greene. While observing her subsequent meeting with Greene, Bond learns that Greene is helping an exiled Bolivian General, Medrano—who murdered Camille's family—to overthrow his government in exchange for a seemingly barren piece of desert.
After rescuing Camille from Medrano, Bond follows Greene to a performance of Tosca in Bregenz, Austria. En route, the CIA head of the South American section, Gregg Beam, strikes a non-interference deal with Greene to maintain access to assumed stocks of Bolivian oil. Bond infiltrates Quantum's meeting at the opera, and a gunfight ensues. A Special Branch bodyguard of Quantum member Guy Haines, an adviser to the British Prime Minister, is killed while in combat with Bond, and M—after Bond refuses to obey orders to return home and debrief—has his passports and credit cards revoked.
Bond convinces his old ally René Mathis to accompany him to Bolivia. At the La Paz airport, they are greeted by Strawberry Fields, an MI6 officer, who demands that Bond return to the UK immediately; nonetheless, Bond soon seduces her before they attend a party Greene holds that night. At the party, Bond again rescues Camille from Greene. Leaving, Bond and Camille are pulled over by Bolivian police working for Medrano. They had earlier attacked Mathis and put him in the boot of Bond's car to frame Bond; and, in the ensuing struggle, Mathis is killed. The following day, Bond and Camille survey Quantum's intended land acquisition by air; their plane is shot down after a brief air battle and they skydive out of the burning plane into a sinkhole. In the cave, Bond and Camille discover Quantum is damming Bolivia's supply of fresh water to create a monopoly. Back in La Paz, Bond meets M and learns that Quantum murdered Fields by drowning her in crude oil. M orders Bond arrested for disobeying orders but he escapes. He risks capture by doubling back to tell M that Fields demonstrated bravery in the field, and this is enough to convince M that Bond can be trusted.
Bond meets with CIA agent Felix Leiter, who discloses Greene and Medrano will meet in the Atacama Desert to finalise the coup. Warned by Leiter, he evades the CIA's Special Activities Division when they attempt to kill him. At the hotel, Greene and Medrano negotiate their terms. Greene then finally reveals his true plans: now that he controls the majority of Bolivia's water supply, Greene forces Medrano to accept a new contract that makes Greene Planet Bolivia's sole water utility company at significantly higher rates. Bond infiltrates the hotel, kills the Chief of Police for betraying Mathis, and confronts Greene. The hotel is destroyed during the ensuing struggle; Camille kills Medrano, avenging the murders of her parents and sister, and Bond captures Greene. After interrogating him about Quantum, Bond leaves Greene stranded in the middle of the desert with only a can of engine oil. Bond and Camille kiss before they part.
Bond travels to Kazan, Russia, where he finds Vesper Lynd's former lover, Yusef Kabira, with a new target, a Canadian agent. Yusef is a member of Quantum who seduces women with valuable connections. Bond decides not to kill Yusef and allows MI6 to arrest him. Outside, M tells Bond that Greene was found in the middle of the desert dead, shot twice and with engine oil in his stomach; Bond denies knowing anything. M also reveals that Leiter has been promoted and has taken Beam's place. She reinstates Bond as an agent; he tells M that he never left. As he leaves, he drops Vesper's necklace in the snow.

Cast:
- Daniel Craig as James Bond. Craig's physical training for his reprise of the role placed extra effort into running and boxing, to spare him the injuries he sustained on his stunts in the first film. Craig felt he was fitter, being less bulky than in the first film. He also practiced speedboating and stunt driving. Craig felt Casino Royale was [physically] "a walk in the park" compared to Quantum of Solace, and required a different performance from him because Quantum of Solace is a revenge film, not a love story like Casino Royale. While filming in Pinewood, he suffered a gash when kicked in his face, which required eight stitches, and a fingertip was sliced off. He laughed these off, noting they did not delay filming, and joked his finger wound would enable him to have a criminal career (though it had grown back when he made this comment). He also had minor plastic surgery on his face. The actor advised Paul Haggis on the script and helped choose Marc Forster as the director.
- Olga Kurylenko as Camille Montes, a Bolivian agent with her own vendetta regarding Greene and Medrano. Forster chose her because out of the 400 women who auditioned, she seemed the least nervous. When she read the script, she was glad she had no love scene with Craig; she felt it would have distracted viewers from her performance. Kurylenko spent three weeks training to fight with weapons, and she learned a form of indoor skydiving known as body flying. Kurylenko said she had to do "training non-stop from the morning to the evening" for the action scenes, overcoming her fears with the help of Craig and the stunt team. She was given a DVD box set of Bond films, since the franchise was not easily available to watch in her native Ukraine. Kurylenko found Michelle Yeoh in Tomorrow Never Dies inspiring "because she did the fight scenes by herself." The producers had intended to cast a South American actress in the role. Kurylenko trained with a dialect coach to perform with a Spanish accent. She said that the accent was easy for her because she has "a lot of hispanic friends, from Latin America and Spain, and it's an accent I've always heard".When reflecting on her experience as a Bond girl, she stated she was most proud of overcoming her fears in performing stunts.
- Mathieu Amalric as Dominic Greene, the main villain. He is a leading member of Quantum posing as a businessman working in reforestation and charity funding for environmental science. Amalric acknowledged taking the role was an easy decision because, "It's impossible to say to your kids that 'I could have been in a Bond film but I refused.'" Amalric wanted to wear make-up for the role, but Forster explained that he wanted Greene not to look grotesque, but to symbolise the hidden evils in society. Amalric modelled his performance on "the smile of Tony Blair [and] the craziness of Sarkozy," the latter of whom he called "the worst villain we [the French] have ever had ... he walks around thinking he's in a Bond film." He later claimed this was not criticism of either politician, but rather an example of how a politician relies on performance instead of a genuine policy to win power. "Sarkozy, is just a better actor than [his presidential opponent] Ségolène Royal—that's all," he explained. Amalric and Forster reconceived the character, who was supposed to have a "special skill" in the script, to someone who uses pure animal instinct when fighting Bond in the climax. Bruno Ganz was also considered for the part, but Forster decided Amalric gave the character a "pitiful" quality.
- Gemma Arterton as MI6 Agent Strawberry Fields, who works at the British consulate in Bolivia. Fields, who is merely an office worker as described by M, takes herself seriously and tries to over-power Bond when the pair meet. She is later seduced by Bond, infiltrates Greene's fund raiser party with him and ends up paying the ultimate price. Forster found Arterton a witty actress and selected her from a reported 1,500 candidates. One of the casting directors asked her to audition for the role, having seen her portray Rosaline in Love's Labour's Lost at the Globe Theatre. Arterton said Fields was "not so frolicsome" as other Bond girls, but is instead "fresh and young, not ... a femme fatale." Arterton described Fields as a homage to the 1960s Bond girls, comparing her red wig to that of Diana Rigg, who played Tracy Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Rigg, alongside Honor Blackman, is one of her favourite Bond girls. Arterton had to film her character's death scene first day on the set, where she was completely covered head to toe in non-toxic black paint. Although she found the experience unpleasant, she believes the scene will be an iconic part of the film. The character's first name, which is a reference to the Beatles song "Strawberry Fields Forever", is never actually uttered on screen; when Bond asks her for her name, she replies, "Just Fields." Robert A. Caplen suggests that this is a conscious effort to portray a woman "whose character attributes are neither undermined nor compromised" by her name, even though her name may have sexual overtones reminiscent of earlier Bond girls.
- Giancarlo Giannini as René Mathis, Bond's ally who was mistakenly believed to be a traitor in Casino Royale. Having been acquitted, he chooses to aid Bond again in his quest to find out who betrayed him.
- Jeffrey Wright as Felix Leiter, Bond's ally at the CIA. This marked the first time the same actor played Leiter twice in a row. Only David Hedison had previously played the character twice, in Live and Let Die (1973) and Licence to Kill (1989), but these performances were not consecutive. Early script drafts gave Leiter a larger role, but his screentime was restricted by on-set rewrites.
- Judi Dench as M. Forster felt Dench was underused in the previous films and wanted to make her part bigger, having her interact with Bond more because she is "the only woman Bond doesn't see in a sexual context," which Forster finds interesting.
- Anatole Taubman as Elvis, Greene's second-in-command. Taubman wanted to make Elvis "as colorful, as edgy and as interesting as possible", with one of his suggestions being the bowl cut. Amalric and Taubman improvised a backstory for Elvis: he is Dominic's cousin and once lived on the streets before being inducted into Quantum. He called Elvis "a bit of a goofball. He thinks he's all that but he's not really. ... He's not a comic guy. He definitely takes himself very serious, but maybe by his taking himself too serious he may become friendly."
- David Harbour as Gregg Beam, the CIA Section Chief for South America and a contact of Felix Leiter.
- Joaquín Cosío as General Medrano, the exiled general whom Greene is helping to get back into power, in return for support of his organisation. He murdered Camille's entire family when she was a young girl.
- Fernando Guillen Cuervo as Carlos, the Colonel of Bolivian Police, the chief of all police forces, and the contact of René Mathis in Bolivia.
- Jesper Christensen as Mr. White, whom Bond captured after he stole the money won at Casino Royale in Montenegro.
- Rory Kinnear as Bill Tanner, M's aide.
- Paul Ritter as Guy Haines
- Tim Pigott-Smith as the British Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs.
- Neil Jackson as Edmund Slate, a henchman who fights Bond in Haiti.
- Simon Kassianides as Yusef, a member of Quantum who seduces female agents and manipulates them into giving away classified information. He is indirectly responsible for Vesper Lynd's death.
- Stana Katic as Corrine Veneau, a Canadian agent and Yusef's latest target.
Glenn Foster as Craig Mitchell, M's bodyguard and a double agent.
- Oona Castilla Chaplin as "damsel in distress"—girl saved by Camille Montes in one of last sequences.
- Lucrezia Lante Della Rovere as Gemma, Mathis' girlfriend.
- Elizabeth Arciniega as Mr. White's girlfriend.
Marc Forster asked his friends and fellow directors Guillermo del Toro and Alfonso Cuarón to appear in cameos. Cuarón appears as a Bolivian helicopter pilot, while del Toro provides several other voices.

Production and Development:
"If you remember in Chinatown, if you control the water you control the whole development of the country. I think it's true. Right now it appears to be oil, but there's a lot of other resources that we don't think about too much but are all essential, and they're very limited and every country needs it. Because every country knows that raising the standard of living (and populations are getting bigger) is the way we're all going."
—Michael G. Wilson on the plot.
In July 2006, as Casino Royale entered post-production, Eon Productions announced that the next film would be based on an original idea by producer Michael G. Wilson. It was decided beforehand the film would be a direct sequel, to exploit Bond's emotions following Vesper's death in the previous film. Just as Casino Royale's theme was terrorism, the sequel focuses on environmentalism. The film was confirmed for a 2 May 2008 release date, with Craig reprising the lead role. Roger Michell, who directed Craig in Enduring Love and The Mother, was in negotiations to direct, but opted out because there was no script. Sony Entertainment vice-chairman Jeff Blake admitted a production schedule of 18 months was a very short window, and the release date was pushed back to late 2008. Neal Purvis and Robert Wade completed their draft of the script by April 2007, and Paul Haggis, who polished the Casino Royale script, began his rewrite the next month.
In June 2007, Marc Forster was confirmed as director. He was surprised that he was approached for the job, stating he was not a big Bond film fan through the years, and that he would not have accepted the project had he not seen Casino Royale prior to making his decision: he felt Bond had been humanised in that film, arguing since travelling the world had become less exotic since the series' advent, it made sense to focus more on Bond as a character. Born in Germany and raised in Switzerland, Forster was the first Bond director not to come from the British Commonwealth of Nations, although he noted Bond's mother is Swiss, making him somewhat appropriate to handle the British icon. The director collaborated strongly with Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson, noting they only blocked two very expensive ideas he had. The director found Casino Royale's 144-minute running time too long, and wanted his follow-up to be "tight and fast ... like a bullet."
"Because Bond plays it real, I thought the political circumstances should be real too, even though Bond shouldn't be a political film. I thought the more political I make it, the more real it feels, not just with Bolivia and what's happening in Haiti, but with all these corporations like Shell and Chevron saying they're green because it's so fashionable to be green. During the Cold War, everything was very clear, the good guys and the bad guys. Today there's much overlapping of good and bad. It isn't as morally distinct, because we all have both elements in us."
—Marc Forster on the political landscape of the film.
Haggis, Forster and Wilson rewrote the story from scratch. Haggis said he completed his script two hours before the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike officially began. Forster noted a running theme in his films were emotionally repressed protagonists, and the theme of the picture would be Bond learning to trust after feeling betrayed by Vesper. Forster said he created the Camille character as a strong female counterpart to Bond rather than a casual love interest: she openly shows emotions similar to those which Bond experiences but is unable to express. Haggis located his draft's climax in the Swiss Alps, but Forster wanted the action sequences to be based around the four classical elements of earth, water, air and fire. The decision to homage Goldfinger in Fields's death came about as Forster wanted to show oil had replaced gold as the most precious material. The producers rejected Haggis's idea that Vesper Lynd had a child, because "Bond was an orphan ... Once he finds the kid, Bond can't just leave the kid." The water supply issue in Bolivia was the main theme of the film, with a story based on the Cochabamba Water Revolt.
Michael G. Wilson decided on the film's title Quantum of Solace only "a few days" before its announcement on 24 January 2008. It was the name of a short story in Ian Fleming's anthology For Your Eyes Only (1960). The film is related to the title in one of its thematic elements: "when the 'Quantum of Solace' drops to zero, humanity and consideration of one human for another is gone." Daniel Craig admitted, "I was unsure at first. Bond is looking for his quantum of solace and that's what he wants, he wants his closure. Ian Fleming says that if you don't have a quantum of solace in your relationship then the relationship is over. It's that spark of niceness in a relationship that if you don't have you might as well give up." He said that "Bond doesn't have that because his girlfriend [Vesper Lynd] has been killed," and therefore, "[Bond is] looking for revenge ... to make himself happy with the world again." Afterwards, Quantum was made the name of the organisation introduced in Casino Royale. Craig noted the letter Q itself looks rather odd. Near the end of the film, the Camille Montes character and Bond have a discussion about their individual quests to avenge the deaths of their loved ones. Montes asks Bond to "let me know what it feels like" when he succeeds, the implication of the title being that it will be a small amount of solace compared to his despair. Bond's lack of emotion when he does exact revenge shows this to be the case.
According to a December 2011 interview with Craig, "We had the bare bones of a script and then there was a writers' strike and there was nothing we could do. We couldn't employ a writer to finish it. I say to myself, 'Never again', but who knows? There was me trying to rewrite scenes—and a writer I am not." He said that he and Forster "were the ones allowed to do it. The rules were that you couldn't employ anyone as a writer, but the actor and director could work on scenes together. We were stuffed. We got away with it, but only just. It was never meant to be as much of a sequel as it was, but it ended up being a sequel, starting where the last one finished."
During filming, after the strike ended, Forster read a spec script by Joshua Zetumer, which he liked, and hired him to reshape scenes for the later parts of the shoot, which the director was still unsatisfied with. Forster had the actors rehearse their scenes, as he liked to film scenes continually. Zetumer rewrote dialogue depending on the actors' ideas each day.

Filming:
Quantum of Solace was shot in six countries. Second unit filming began in Italy at the Palio di Siena horse race on 16 August 2007: although at this point Forster was unsure how it would fit into the film. Some scenes were filmed also in Maratea and Craco, two small distinctive towns in Basilicata in southern Italy. Other places used for location shooting were Madrid in August 2007; Baja California, Mexico in early 2008, for shots of the aerial battle; Malcesine, Limone sul Garda and Tremosine in Italy during March, and at Talamone during the end of April. The main unit began on 3 January 2008, at Pinewood Studios. The 007 Stage was used for the fight in the art gallery, and an MI6 safehouse hidden within the city's cisterns, while other stages housed Bond's Bolivian hotel suite, and the MI6 headquarters. Interior and exterior airport scenes were filmed at Farnborough Airfield and the snowy closing scenes were filmed at the Bruneval Barracks in Aldershot.
Shooting in Panama City began on 7 February 2008 at Howard Air Force Base. The country doubled for Haiti and Bolivia, with the National Institute of Culture of Panama standing in for a hotel in the latter country. A sequence requiring several hundred extras was also shot at nearby Colón. Shooting in Panama was also carried out at Fort Sherman, a former US military base on the Colón coast. Forster was disappointed he could only shoot the boat chase in that harbour, as he had a more spectacular vision for the scene. Officials in the country worked with the locals to "minimise inconvenience" for the cast and crew, and in return hoped the city's exposure in the film would increase tourism. The crew was going to move to Cusco, Peru for ten days of filming on 2 March, but the location was cancelled for budget reasons. Twelve days of filming in Chile began on 24 March at Antofagasta. There was shooting in Cobija, the Paranal Observatory, and other locations in the Atacama Desert. Forster chose the desert and the observatory's ESO Hotel to represent Bond's rigid emotions, and being on the verge of committing a vengeful act as he confronts Greene in the film's climax.
While filming in Sierra Gorda, Chile, the local mayor, Carlos Lopez, staged a protest because he was angry at the filmmakers' portrayal of the Antofagasta region as part of Bolivia. He was arrested, detained briefly, and put on trial two days later. Eon dismissed his claim that they needed his permission to film in the area. Michael G. Wilson also explained Bolivia was appropriate to the plot, because of the country's history of water problems, and was surprised the two countries disliked each other a century after the War of the Pacific. In a poll by Chilean daily newspaper La Segunda, 75% of its readers disagreed with Lopez's actions, due to the negative image they felt it presented of Chile, and the controversy's potential to put off productions looking to film in the country in the future.
From 4–12 April, the main unit shot on Sienese rooftops. Shooting on the real rooftops turned out to be less expensive than building them at Pinewood. The next four weeks were scheduled for filming the car chase at Lake Garda and Carrara. On 19 April, an Aston Martin employee driving a DBS to the set crashed into the lake. He survived, and was fined £400 for reckless driving. Another accident occurred on 21 April, and two days later, two stuntmen were seriously injured, with one, Greek stuntman Aris Comninos, having to be put in intensive care. Filming of the scenes was temporarily halted so that Italian police could investigate the causes of the accidents. Stunt co-ordinator Gary Powell said the accidents were a testament to the realism of the action. Rumours of a "curse" spread among tabloid media, something which deeply offended Craig, who disliked that they compared Comninos' accident to something like his minor finger injury later on the shoot (also part of the "curse"). Comninos recovered safely from his injury.

Filming took place at the floating opera stage at Bregenz, Austria, from 28 April – 9 May 2008. The sequence, where Bond stalks the villains during a performance of Tosca, required 1500 extras. The production used a large model of an eye, which Forster felt fitted in the Bond style, and the opera itself has parallels to the film. A short driving sequence was filmed at the nearby Feldkirch, Vorarlberg. The crew returned to Italy from 13–17 May to shoot a (planned) car crash at the marble quarry in Carrara, and a recreation of the Palio di Siena at the Piazza del Campo in Siena. 1000 extras were hired for a scene where Bond emerges from the Fonte Gaia. Originally, he would have emerged from the city's cisterns at Siena Cathedral, but this was thought disrespectful. By June, the crew returned to Pinewood for four weeks, where new sets (including the interior of the hotel in the climax) were built. The wrap party was held on 21 June.

Design:
Production designer Peter Lamont, a crew member on eighteen previous Bond films, retired after Casino Royale. Forster hired Dennis Gassner in his stead, having admired his work on The Truman Show and the films of the Coen brothers. Craig said the film would have "a touch of Ken Adam," while Michael G. Wilson also called Gassner's designs "a postmodern look at modernism." Forster said he felt the early Bond films' design "were ahead of their time," and enjoyed the clashing of an older style with his own because it created a unique look unto itself. Gassner wanted his sets to emphasise Craig's "great angular, textured face and wonderful blue eyes," and totally redesigned the MI6 headquarters because he felt Judi Dench "was a bit tired in the last film, so I thought, let's bring her into a new world."
Louise Frogley replaced Lindy Hemming as costume designer, though Hemming remained as supervisor. Hemming hired Brioni for Bond's suits since her tenure on the series began with 1995's GoldenEye, but Lindsay Pugh, another supervisor, explained their suits were "too relaxed." Tom Ford was hired to tailor "sharper" suits for Craig. Pugh said the costumes aimed towards the 1960s feel, especially for Bond and Fields. Prada provided the dresses for both Bond girls. Jasper Conran designed Camille's ginger bandeau, bronze skirt and gold fish necklace, while Chrome Hearts designed gothic jewellery for Amalric's character, which the actor liked enough to keep after filming. Sophie Harley, who created Vesper Lynd's earrings and Algerian loveknot necklace in Casino Royale, was called upon to create another version of the necklace.
The film returns to the traditional gun barrel opening shot, which was altered into part of the story for Casino Royale where it was moved to the end of the title sequence. In this film the gun barrel sequence was moved to the end of the movie, which Wilson explained was done for a surprise, and to signify the conclusion of the story begun in the previous film. The opening credits sequence was created by MK12; Having worked on Forster's Stranger than Fiction and The Kite Runner, MK12 spontaneously began developing the sequence early on in production, and had a good idea of its appearance which meant it did not have to be redone when the title singer was changed. MK12 selected various twilight colours to represent Bond's mood and focused on a dot motif based on the gunbarrel shot. MK12 also worked on scenes with graphical user interface, including the electronic table MI6 use, and the Port-au-Prince, Haiti title cards.

Effects:
Quantum of Solace was the last in Ford Motor's three-film deal that began with 2002's Die Another Day. Although Ford sold over 90% of the Aston Martin company in 2007, the Aston Martin DBS V12 returned for the film's car chase around Lake Garda; Dan Bradley was hired as second unit director because of his work on the second and third Bourne films, so the film would continue the gritty action style begun in Casino Royale. He had intended to use Ford GTs for the opening chase, but it was replaced by the Alfa Romeo 159. After location filming in Italy, further close-ups of Craig, the cars and the truck were shot at Pinewood against a bluescreen. Originally three Alfa Romeos were in the sequence: but Forster felt the scene was running too long and re-edited the scene so it only looked like two Romeos were chasing Bond. Six Aston Martins were destroyed during filming, and one of them was purchased by a fan.
Fourteen cameras were used to film the Palio di Siena, footage which was later edited into the main sequence. Aerial shots using helicopters were banned, and the crew were also forbidden from showing any violence "involving either people or animals." To shoot the foot chase in Siena in April 2008 four camera cranes were built in the town, and a cable camera was also used. Framestore worked on the Siena chase, duplicating the 1000 extras during principal photography to match shots of the 40,000 strong audience at the real Palio, removing wires that held Craig and the stuntmen in the rooftop segment of the chase, and digital expansion of the floor and skylight in the art gallery Bond and Mitchell fall into. The art gallery fight was intended to be simple, but during filming Craig's stunt double accidentally fell from the construction scaffolding. Forster preferred the idea of Bond hanging from ropes reaching for his gun to kill Mitchell, rather than having both men run out of the building to continue their chase as specified in the script, and the number of effects shots increased.
To film the aerial dogfight, a "Snakehead" camera was built and placed on the nose and tail of a Piper Aerostar 700. SolidWorks, who provided the software used to design the camera, stated "pilots for the first time can fly as aggressively as they dare without sacrificing the drama of the shot." The camera could turn 360 degrees and was shaped like a periscope. The crew also mounted SpaceCams on helicopters, and placed cameras with 1600 mm lenses underground, to cover the action. Forster wanted to film the plane fight as a homage to Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest, and chose planes like the Douglas DC-3 to suit that.
The free-fall scene involved its own set of challenges, Craig disliked the idea of "being hung by wires and blown by a large fan in front of a green screen" but actual sky diving coverage has serious drawbacks. It's not only difficult, dangerous and time-consuming, but nearly always results in problematic head-replacements for close-ups. Stunt co-ordinator Gary Powell and VFX Designer Kevin Tod Haug, presented the idea of filming the scene in a large vertical wind tunnel in Bedford in order to do this sequence as practically as possible. While a great solution for the actors' performances the technique presented enormous VFX challenges: relighting shots captured in a tall white tube to match the sky over the Bolivian desert, and the impossibility of filming medium to wide shots of the actors. An array of eight Dalsa Origin cameras (supported by 7 HD cameras and a 35mm hand-held camera, all running in sync) was used to create a virtual camera with which to shoot the actors floating in the simulator. Ged Wright and his team at Double Negative developed a method to use the data from these cameras that allowed these real performances to be placed in a synthetic environment as seen by a synthetic camera. During the shooting in the wind tunnel Craig and Kurylenko wore wind-resistant contact lenses that enabled them to open their eyes as they fell. For safety and comfort, they only shot for thirty seconds at a time. Forster wished he had more time to work on the free-fall scene.
The Moving Picture Company created the climactic hotel sequence. The fire effects were supervised by Chris Corbould, and post-production MPC had to enhance the sequence by making the smoke look closer to the actors, so it would look more dangerous. A full-scale replica of the building's exterior was used for the exploding part Bond and Camille escape from. The boat chase was another scene that required very little CGI. Machine FX worked on replacing a few shots of visible stuntmen with a digital version of Craig's head, and recreated the boats Bond jumps over on his motorcycle to make it look more dangerous. Crowd creation was done for the Tosca scene by Machine FX, to make the performance look like it had sold out. Forster edited the opera scene to resemble The Man Who Knew Too Much. In total, there are 900+ visual effects shots in Quantum of Solace.

Music:
David Arnold, who composed the scores for the previous four Bond films, returned for Quantum of Solace. He said that Forster likes to work very closely with his composers and that, in comparison to the accelerated schedule he was tied to on Casino Royale, the intention was to spend a long time scoring the film to "really work it out." He also said he would be "taking a different approach" with the score. Arnold composed the music based on impressions from reading the script, and Forster edited those into the film. As with Casino Royale, Arnold kept use of the "James Bond Theme" to a minimum. Arnold collaborated with Kieran Hebden for "Crawl, End Crawl," a remix of the score played during the end credits.
Jack White of The White Stripes and Alicia Keys collaborated on "Another Way to Die," the first Bond music duet. They had wanted to work together for two years beforehand. The song was recorded in Nashville, Tennessee; White played the drums while Keys performed on the piano. The Memphis Horns also contributed to the track. White's favourite Bond theme is John Barry's instrumental piece for On Her Majesty's Secret Service, and he watched various opening credit sequences from the series for inspiration while mixing the track. Mark Ronson and Amy Winehouse had recorded a demo track for the film, but Ronson explained Winehouse's well-publicised legal issues in the preceding weeks made her "not ready to record any music" at that time.

Release:
The film premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square on 29 October 2008. Princes William and Harry attended, and proceeds from the screening were donated to the charities Help for Heroes and the Royal British Legion. The film was originally scheduled to be released in the UK and North America on 7 November; however, Eon pushed forward the British date to 31 October during filming, while the American date was pushed back in August to 14 November, after Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince had been moved to 2009, thereby allowing the distributors to market the film over the autumn blockbuster Thanksgiving holiday weekend. In Australia, the film was moved a week to 19 November, after 20th Century Fox chose to release Australia on Quantum of Solace's original date of 26 November.

Marketing:
Returning product placement partners from Casino Royale included Ford, Heineken Pilsener, Smirnoff, Omega SA, Virgin Atlantic Airways and Sony Ericsson. A reported £50 million was earned in product placement, which tops the Bond film's record of £44 million for Die Another Day. The 2009 Ford Ka is driven by Camille in the film. Avon created a fragrance called Bond Girl 007 with Gemma Arterton as the "face" of the product. Coca-Cola became a promotional partner, rebranding Coke Zero as "Coke Zero Zero 7." A tie-in advert featured the orchestral element of "Another Way to Die." In the film, Coca-Cola was briefly seen being served at Dominic Greene's party. Sony held a competition, "Mission for a Million," enabling registered players to use their products to complete certain tasks. Each completed "mission" gives consumers a chance to win $1 million and a trip to a top secret location.

Merchandise:
Corgi International Limited made 5-inch action figures and gadgets (such as a voice-activated briefcase), as well as their traditional die-cast toy vehicles. They also created 7-inch figures of characters from the previous films. Scalextric released four racing sets to coincide with the film. Activision released their first James Bond game, also titled Quantum of Solace, which is based on both Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. It is the first Bond game to feature Craig's likeness and the first seventh generation console game in the series. Swatch designed a series of wrist watches, each of them inspired by a Bond villain.
Though the screenplay did not get made into a novel despite its original storyline, Penguin Books published a compilation of Fleming's short stories entitled Quantum of Solace: The Complete James Bond Short Stories, with a UK release date of 29 May 2008 and a North American release date of 26 August 2008. The book combines the contents of Fleming's two short story collections, For Your Eyes Only—including the original "Quantum of Solace" short story—and Octopussy and The Living Daylights.
The November/December 2008 issue of Cigar Aficionado was a special James Bond edition written by David Giammarco, author of For Your Eyes Only: Behind the Scenes of the James Bond Films, and featured an extensive 20-page feature on the making of Quantum of Solace from his exclusive interviews on location with Daniel Craig, Gemma Arterton, Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Amalric, director Marc Forster, and producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson. This tribute issue of the upscale magazine also featured Giammarco's in-depth profile of 007 author Ian Fleming and the 46-year history of the James Bond films. The Cigar Aficionado James Bond special edition became the magazine's biggest-selling issue around the world.

Home media:
Quantum of Solace was released on DVD and Blu-ray by MGM via 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment in Australia, the UK and North America from 18 to 24 March 2009. At the DVD sales chart the film opened at No. 3, grossing $21,894,957 from 1.21m DVD units sold. As of 1 November 2009, 2,643,250 DVD units were sold, generating $44,110,750 in sales revenue. These figures do not include Blu-ray sales or DVD rentals. The DVDs were released in both a standard one-disc set and a deluxe two-disc special edition. There are no audio commentaries or deleted scenes on these editions.

Reaction and Box office:
Upon its opening in the UK, the film grossed £4.9 million ($8 million), breaking the record for the largest Friday opening (31 October 2008) in the UK. The film then broke the UK opening weekend record, taking £15.5 million ($25 million) in its first weekend, surpassing the previous record of £14.9 million held by Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. It earned a further £14 million in France and Sweden—where it opened on the same day. The weekend gross of the equivalent of $10.6 million in France was a record for the series, surpassing what Casino Royale made in five days by 16%. The $2.7 million gross in Sweden was the fourth-highest opening for a film there.
The following week, the film was playing in sixty countries. It grossed the equivalent of $39.3 million in the UK, $16.5 million in France and $7.7 million in Germany on 7 November 2008. The film broke records in Switzerland, Finland, United Arab Emirates, Nigeria, Romania and Slovenia. Its Chinese and Indian openings were the second largest ever for foreign-language films.
The film grossed $27 million on its opening day in 3,451 cinemas in Canada and the United States, where it was the number one film for the weekend, with US67.5 million and US19,568 average per cinema. It was the highest-grossing opening weekend Bond film in the US, and tied with The Incredibles for the biggest November opening outside of the Harry Potter series. The film earned a B- from CinemaScore's audience surveys. From the 31 October British opening through to the 14 November US opening weekend, the film had grossed a total $319,128,882 worldwide. As of 10 February 2010, it has grossed the equivalent of $417,722,300 in countries other than Canada and the US, where it grossed $168,368,427, to give a total of $586,090,727.

Critical response:
Reviews for Quantum of Solace have been mixed. Of the 244 reviews listed on Rotten Tomatoes, 64% are positive, with an average rating of 6.1/10. Metacritic calculated a score of 58 out of 100 from 38 reviews, indicating a "mixed or average" response. Critics generally preferred Casino Royale, but continued to praise Craig's depiction of Bond, and agree that the film is still an enjoyable addition to the series. The action sequences and pacing were praised, but criticism grew over the realism and serious but gritty feel that the film carried over.
Roger Moore, the third actor to play Bond in the films, continued to feel Craig was a "damn good Bond but the film as a whole, there was a bit too much flash cutting [and] it was just like a commercial of the action. There didn't seem to be any geography and you were wondering what the hell was going on." Kim Newman of Empire gave it 4/5, remarking it was not "bigger and better than Casino Royale, [which is] perhaps a smart move in that there's still a sense at the finish that Bond's mission has barely begun." However, he expressed nostalgia for the more humorous Bond films. The Sunday Times review noted that "following Casino Royale was never going to be easy, but the director Marc Forster has brought the brand's successful relaunch crashing back to earth – with a yawn"; the screenplay "is at times incomprehensible" and the casting "is a mess." The review concludes that "Bond has been stripped of his iconic status. He no longer represents anything particularly British, or even modern. In place of glamour, we get a spurious grit; instead of style, we get product placement; in place of fantasy, we get a redundant and silly realism." The Guardian gave a more positive review, rating it as 3/5 stars, and was particularly fond of Craig's performance, saying he "made the part his own, every inch the coolly ruthless agent-killer, nursing a broken heart and coldly suppressed rage" and calling the film "a crash-bang Bond, high on action, low on quips, long on location glamour, short on product placement"; it concludes "Quantum of Solace isn't as good as Casino Royale: the smart elegance of Craig's Bond debut has been toned down in favour of conventional action. But the man himself powers this movie; he carries the film: it's an indefinably difficult task for an actor. Craig measures up."
Screen Daily says, "Notices will focus—rightly—on Craig's magnetism as the steely, sexy, murderous MI6 agent, but two other factors weigh in and freshen up proceedings: Forster's new technical team, led by cinematographer Roberto Schaefer and production designer Dennis Gassner. And the ongoing shift of M, as played by Judi Dench, to front and centre: the Bond girls fade into insignificance as she becomes his moral counterpoint and theirs is the only real relationship on screen." The review continues, "Bond is, as has been previously noted, practically the Martin Scorsese of the BAFTAs: 22 films later, with grosses probably close to the GDP of one of the small nations it depicts, it's still waiting for that Alexander Korda award. The best Casino Royale could achieve was a gong for sound. Will this be the year that changes its fortunes?" Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, who praised the previous film, disliked Quantum of Solace. He wrote that the plot was mediocre, characters weak and that Bond lacked his usual personality, despite his praise for Craig's interpretation of the role. Throughout his review, he emphasised that "James Bond is not an action hero." Kate Muir wrote in The Times that "The Bond franchise is 50 years old this year, and the scriptless mess of Quantum of Solace may be considered its mid-life crisis", before she went on to praise the film's successor Skyfall as a "resurrection". Some writers criticised the choice of Quantum of Solace as a title. "Yes, it's a bad title," wrote Marni Weisz, the editor of Famous, a Canadian film publication distributed in cinemas in that country, in an editorial entitled "At least it's not Octopussy."

Accolades:
The film was nominated for Best Original Score, Best Original Song, Visual Effects, Film and Sound Editing at the 2008 Satellite Awards, winning Best Song. It was nominated for Best Action Movie at the 2009 Critics' Choice Awards, and at the Empire Awards, which is voted for by the public, it was shortlisted for Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Newcomer, Best Thriller and Best Soundtrack. It was nominated for the Saturn Award for Best Action/Adventure/Thriller Film, while Kurylenko and Dench were both nominated for the Best Supporting Actress award. An editorial by The Times also listed the film's pre-titles sequence as the tenth-greatest car chase in film history.

Casino Royale - 2006

By Wikipedia
Casino Royale is the twenty-first film in the Eon Productions James Bond film series and the first to star Daniel Craig as fictional MI6 agent James Bond. Directed by Martin Campbell and written by Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and Paul Haggis, the film marks the third screen adaptation of Ian Fleming's 1953 novel of the same name. Casino Royale is set at the beginning of Bond's career as Agent 007, just as he is earning his licence to kill. After preventing a terrorist attack at Miami International Airport, Bond falls for Vesper Lynd, the treasury employee assigned to provide the money he needs to bankrupt terrorist financier Le Chiffre by beating him in a high-stakes poker game. The story arc continues in the following Bond film, Quantum of Solace (2008).
Casino Royale reboots the series, establishing a new timeline and narrative framework not meant to precede or succeed any previous Bond film, which allowed the film to show a less experienced and more vulnerable Bond. For the first time in the series, the character Miss Moneypenny does not appear. Casting the film involved a widespread search for a new actor to portray James Bond, and significant controversy surrounded Craig when he was selected to succeed Pierce Brosnan in October 2005. Location filming took place in the Czech Republic, the Bahamas, Italy and the United Kingdom with interior sets built at Pinewood Studios. Although part of the storyline was set in Montenegro, no filming took place there. Casino Royale was produced by Eon Productions for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Columbia Pictures, making it the first Eon-produced Bond film to be co-produced by the latter studio.
Casino Royale premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square on 14 November 2006. It received largely positive critical response, with reviewers highlighting Craig's performance and the reinvention of the character of Bond. It earned over $599 million worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing James Bond film until the release of Skyfall in 2012.

Plot:
After killing a traitorous MI6 section chief—who has been selling classified information—and the station chief's contact, James Bond gets his double-0 status. He then goes to Madagascar in pursuit of an international bomb-maker named Mollaka. After a parkour chase to an embassy, Bond kills his target and escapes by setting off an explosion. Searching through Mollaka's mobile phone, Bond discovers a text message, which he traces to Alex Dimitrios, an associate of banker and terrorist financier Le Chiffre. Le Chiffre's investments involve short-selling stock in successful companies and then engineering terrorist attacks to sink their share prices.
Bond travels to the Bahamas where Dimitrios has a home and seduces his wife, Solange Dimitrios. After answering a phone call, Solange reveals that her husband is flying to Miami, so Bond leaves to pursue him. In Miami, 007 kills Dimitrios and follows Le Chiffre's henchman, Carlos, to Miami International Airport. There, Bond foils Le Chiffre's plan to destroy the prototype Skyfleet airliner.
Left with a huge loss and under pressure to recoup his terrorist clients' money, Le Chiffre sets up a high-stakes Texas hold 'em tournament at the Casino Royale in Montenegro. Hoping that a defeat would force Le Chiffre to aid the British government in exchange for protection from his creditors, MI6 enters Bond into the tournament. On the train to Montenegro, Bond meets Vesper Lynd, a British Treasury agent whose role is to protect the government's interests, specifically the $10 million buy-in; on his arrival at the hotel, Bond meets local MI6 contact René Mathis. Bond loses his initial stake and Vesper refuses to give him $5 million to continue playing. Frustrated by his failure, Bond resolves to assassinate Le Chiffre. Before he can, a fellow player reveals himself as CIA agent Felix Leiter, who offers to stake Bond in exchange for custody of Le Chiffre. Back in the game, Bond begins to amass chips. Le Chiffre attempts to kill Bond when his girlfriend Valenka poisons his drink, but he survives with the help of Vesper, wins the tournament, and the winnings are deposited into a Swiss bank account. Soon afterward, Le Chiffre abducts Vesper and uses her as bait to capture Bond.
Le Chiffre tortures Bond for the bank account's password, but is interrupted by Mr. White, who kills him. Bond awakens in a hospital on Lake Como and has Mathis, whom Le Chiffre identified as a double agent, arrested. Bond admits to Vesper that he is in love with her, and posts his resignation to M. The couple go to Venice, where Bond learns that his winnings were never deposited in the Treasury's account. Realising that the suddenly absent Vesper was in the process of stealing them, he pursues her and the men to whom she gives the money into a building under renovation, which is being kept from sinking only by inflatable supports. A gunfight ensues and the supports are punctured. Bond kills the men and tries to rescue Vesper, but she locks herself in an iron-frame lift and allows herself to drown as the building sinks. Mr. White, watching from a nearby balcony, walks away with the money.
Bond rejoins the service and learns that Vesper had a French-Algerian boyfriend who was kidnapped by the organisation behind Le Chiffre and Mr. White to blackmail her into co-operation, and that she agreed to deliver the money in exchange for saving Bond's life. Bond then discovers a text from Vesper with White's name and mobile phone number, which he uses to find White. After wounding and capturing White, he introduces himself: "The name's Bond — James Bond."

Cast:
- Daniel Craig as James Bond: A British SIS officer who, after being assigned 00-status, is sent on a mission to arrest a bomb-maker in Madagascar, where he stumbles upon Le Chiffre's terrorist cell and is then sent to defeat him in a high-stakes poker game at Casino Royale.
- Eva Green as Vesper Lynd: An agent for HM Treasury assigned to supervise Bond and finance him in a high stakes poker game.
- Mads Mikkelsen as Le Chiffre: The main antagonist. A banker who services many of the world's terrorists. He is a mathematical genius and expert chess player and uses these skills when playing poker.
- Judi Dench as M: The head of MI6. Although she feels she has promoted Bond too soon and chides him for his rash actions, she acts as an important maternal figure in his life. Dench was the only cast member carried through from the Pierce Brosnan films.
- Jeffrey Wright as Felix Leiter: A CIA operative participating in the poker tournament while assisting Bond. This is the first Eon-produced Bond film in which Leiter is played by a black actor. (The only other black actor to portray Leiter was Bernie Casey in Never Say Never Again, which was not produced by Eon.)
- Giancarlo Giannini as René Mathis: Bond's contact in Montenegro.
- Simon Abkarian as Alex Dimitrios: Another contractor in the international terrorist underworld and associate of Le Chiffre, based in the Bahamas.
- Caterina Murino as Solange Dimitrios: Dimitrios' wife, whom Bond seduces. She is killed by Le Chiffre for unintentionally revealing one of his plans to Bond.
- Ivana Miličević as Valenka: Le Chiffre's girlfriend.
- Isaac de Bankolé as Steven Obanno: A leader of the Lord's Resistance Army, introduced to Le Chiffre by Mr. White to account his finances.
- Jesper Christensen as Mr. White: A liaison for an unnamed criminal organisation.
- Sébastien Foucan as Mollaka: A bomb-maker pursued by Bond through a construction site in Madagascar.
- Tobias Menzies as Villiers: M's young secretary at MI6 Headquarters.
- Ludger Pistor as Mendel: A Swiss banker responsible for all monetary transactions during and after the poker tournament.
- Claudio Santamaria as Carlos: A terrorist employed by Le Chiffre to blow up an aircraft.
- Richard Sammel as Gettler: An assassin who works for an unnamed criminal organisation and contacts Vesper in Venice.
- Clemens Schick as Kratt: Le Chiffre's bodyguard, who often accompanies his boss wherever he travels
- Joseph Millson as Carter: An MI6 agent who accompanies Bond in Madagascar.
- Ben Cooke as Williams: An MI6 agent who debriefs Bond in London.
- Darwin Shawh as Fisher: Dryden's underground contact. M sends Bond to kill him, his first official target. Bond tracks him down, nearly drowns him, and then shoots him dead.
- Diane Hartford as Card Player.
- Casino Royale includes a cameo by British entrepreneur Richard Branson (seen being frisked at Miami airport). The cameo was cut out of the in-flight versions shown on British Airways' in-flight entertainment systems, as was a shot of the Virgin Atlantic aircraft Branson supplied.

Production:
Casino Royale was previously produced as a 1954 television episode and a 1967 satirical film. Eon Productions gained the rights for Casino Royale in 1999 after Sony Pictures Entertainment exchanged them for MGM's rights to Spider-Man. In March 2004, Neal Purvis and Robert Wade began writing a screenplay for Pierce Brosnan as Bond, aiming to bring back the flavour of Ian Fleming's original Bond novels. Paul Haggis' main contribution was to rewrite the climax of the film. He explained, "the draft that was there was very faithful to the book and there was a confession, so in the original draft the character confessed and killed herself. She then sent Bond to chase after the villains; Bond chased the villains into the house. I don't know why but I thought that Vesper had to be in the sinking house and Bond has to want to kill her and then try and save her."
Director Quentin Tarantino expressed interest in directing an adaptation of Casino Royale, although he did not follow this up with Eon. Tarantino also expressed interest in Casino Royale after Pulp Fiction. He claims to have worked behind the scenes with the Fleming family, and believed this was the reason why filmmakers finally went ahead with Casino Royale. Tarantino also said, he would have set it in the 1950s, like the novel, would have filmed it in black-and-white and would have only made it with Pierce Brosnan as Bond. In February 2005, Martin Campbell was announced as the film's director. Later in 2005, Sony led a consortium that purchased MGM, allowing Sony to gain distribution rights starting with the film.
Eon admitted that they had relied too heavily on CGI effects in the more recent films, particularly Die Another Day, and were keen to accomplish the stunts in Casino Royale "the old fashioned way". In keeping with this drive for more realism, screenwriters Purvis, Wade and Haggis wanted the script to follow as closely as possible to the original 1953 novel, keeping Fleming's darker storyline and characterisation of Bond.

Casting:
Pierce Brosnan had originally signed a deal for four films when he was cast in the role of James Bond. This was fulfilled with the production of Die Another Day in 2002. However, at this stage Brosnan was approaching his 50th birthday, and speculation began that the producers were seeking to replace him with a younger actor. Brosnan officially announced he was stepping down in February 2005. At one point producer Michael G. Wilson claimed there was a list of over 200 names being considered for his replacement. Croatian actor Goran Višnjić auditioned for the role the same day as Craig, but was reportedly unable to master a British accent. New Zealander Karl Urban was considered, but was unable to make the screen test due to filming commitments. According to Martin Campbell, Henry Cavill was the only actor in serious contention for the role, but at 22 years old, was considered too young. Sam Worthington was also considered.
In May 2005, Daniel Craig announced that MGM and producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli had assured him that he would get the role of Bond, and Matthew Vaughn told reporters that MGM offered him the opportunity to direct, but Eon Productions at that point had not approached either of them. A year beforehand, Craig rejected the offer, as he felt the series had descended into formula: only when he read the script did he become interested. Craig read all of Fleming's novels to prepare for the part, and cited Mossad and British Secret Service agents who served as advisors on the set of Munich as inspiring because, "Bond has just come out of the service and he's a killer. [...] You can see it in their eyes, you know immediately: oh, hello, he's a killer. There's a look. These guys walk into a room and very subtly they check the perimeters for an exit. That's the sort of thing I wanted."
On 14 October 2005 Eon Productions, Sony Pictures Entertainment and MGM announced at a press conference in London that Craig would be the sixth actor to portray James Bond. A tuxedo-clad Craig boarded a Royal Marines Rigid Raider from the HMS Belfast before speeding to the HMS President where he was introduced to the world's press. Significant controversy followed the decision, with some critics and fans expressing doubt the producers had made the right choice. Throughout the entire production period, Internet campaigns such as danielcraigisnotbond.com expressed their dissatisfaction and threatened to boycott the film in protest. Craig, unlike previous actors, was not considered by the protesters to fit the tall, dark, handsome and charismatic image of Bond to which viewers had been accustomed. The Daily Mirror ran a front page news story critical of Craig, with the headline, The Name's Bland – James Bland.
The next important casting was that of the lead Bond girl, Vesper Lynd. Casting director Debbie McWilliams acknowledged that Hollywood actresses Angelina Jolie and Charlize Theron were "strongly considered" for the role and that Belgian actress Cécile de France had also auditioned, but her English accent "wasn't up to scratch." Audrey Tautou was also considered, but not chosen because of her role in The Da Vinci Code that was released in May 2006. It was announced on 16 February 2006 that Eva Green would play the part.

Filming:
Principal photography for Casino Royale commenced on 3 January 2006 and concluded on 20 July 2006. The film was primarily shot at Barrandov Studios in Prague, with additional location shooting in the Bahamas, Italy and the United Kingdom. The shoot concluded at Pinewood Studios.
Initially, Michael G. Wilson confirmed that Casino Royale would either be filmed or take place in Prague and South Africa. However, Eon Productions encountered problems in securing film locations in South Africa. After no other locations became available, the producers had to reconsider their options. In September 2005, Martin Campbell and director of photography Phil Meheux were scouting Paradise Island in the Bahamas as a possible location for the film. On 6 October 2005, Martin Campbell confirmed that Casino Royale would film in the Bahamas and "maybe Italy". In addition to the extensive location filming, studio work including choreography and stunt coordination practice was performed at the Barrandov Studios in Prague and at Pinewood Studios where the film used several stages as well as the paddock tank and the historic 007 Stage. Further shooting in the UK was scheduled for Dunsfold Aerodrome in Surrey, the cricket pavilion at Eton College(although that particular scene was cut from the completed movie) and the Millbrook Vehicle Proving Ground in Bedfordshire.
After Prague, the production moved to the Bahamas. Several locations around New Providence were used for filming during February and March, particularly on Paradise Island. Footage set in Mbale, Uganda, was filmed at Black Park, a Country Park in Buckinghamshire, on 4 July 2006. Additional scenes took place at Albany House, an estate owned by golfers Ernie Els and Tiger Woods. The crew returned to the Czech Republic in April, and continued there, filming in Prague, Planá and Loket, before completing in the town of Karlovy Vary in May. A famous Czech spa, Karlovy Vary, in German known as the Karlsbad, was used as the exterior of the Casino Royale, with the Grandhotel Pupp serving as "Hotel Splendide". The main Italian location was Venice, where the majority of the film's ending is set. Other scenes in the latter half of the film were shot in late May and early June at the Villa del Balbianello on the shores of Lake Como. Further exterior shooting for the movie took place at properties such as the Villa la Gaeta, near the lakeside town of Menaggio.
A recreation of the Body Worlds exhibit provided a setting for one scene in the film. Among the Body Worlds plastinates featured in that scene were the Poker Playing Trio (which plays a key role in one scene) and Rearing Horse and Rider. The exhibition's developer and promoter, German anatomist Gunther von Hagens, also has a cameo appearance in the film, although only his trademark hat is actually visible on screen.
On 30 July 2006, a fire broke out at the 007 Stage. The damage was significant, but had no effect on the release of Casino Royale as the incident occurred one week after filming had been completed, and the sets were in the process of being dismantled. On 11 August 2006, Pinewood Studios confirmed that no attempt would be made to salvage the remains of the stage; instead it would be rebuilt from scratch.

Effects:
In designing the credit sequence for the film, graphic designer Daniel Kleinman was inspired by the cover of the 1953 British first edition of Casino Royale, which featured Ian Fleming's original design of a playing card bordered by eight red hearts dripping with blood. Kleinman said, "The hearts not only represent cards but the tribulations of Bond's love story. So I took that as inspiration to use playing card graphics in different ways in the titles," like a club representing a puff of gun smoke, and slashed arteries spurting thousands of tiny hearts. In creating the shadow images of the sequence, Kleinman digitised the footage of Craig and the film's stuntmen on the Inferno visual effects system, at Framestore CFC in London; the actors' silhouettes were incorporated into more than 20 digitally animated scenes depicting intricate and innovative card patterns. Kleinman decided not to use the female silhouettes commonly seen throughout the Bond title sequences, considering that the women did not fit with both the film's spirit and the storyline following Bond falling in love.
For the rest of the film, Special Effects and Miniature Effects Supervisor Chris Corbould returned to a more realistic style of film making and significantly reduced digital effects. According to Corbould, "CGI is a great tool and can be very useful, but I will fight to the tooth and nail to do something for real. It's the best way to go". Three scenes involving primarily physical effects in the film were the chase at a building site in Madagascar, the Miami Airport chase sequence, and the sinking Venetian house, with sets located on the Grand Canal and in Pinewood Studios.
First on the schedule were the scenes on the Madagascar building site, shot in the Bahamas on the site of a derelict hotel which Michael G. Wilson had become acquainted with in 1977 during the filming of The Spy Who Loved Me. In the scene, Bond drives a digger toward the building, slamming into the concrete plinth on which Mollaka is running. The stunt team built a model and put forward several ways in which the digger could conceivably take out the concrete, including taking out the pillar underneath. A section of the concrete wall was removed to fit the digger, and reinforced with steel.
The sequence at Miami International Airport was partly shot at the Dunsfold Aerodrome, in Surrey, which is known from British car show Top Gear, with some footage from the Prague and Miami airports. In filming the scene in which the engine thrust of the moving aircraft blows the police car high into the air, second unit directors Ian Lowe, Terry Madden and Alex Witt used a crane with a strong lead cable attached to the rear bumper of the vehicle to move it up and backwards at the moment of full extension away from the plane.
The Skyfleet S570 aircraft in the film was an ex-British Airways 747-200B G-BDXJ which had its engines removed and was modified for its appearance in the film. The modified aircraft had the outboard engines replaced by external fuel tanks, while the inboard engines were replaced by a mock-up pair of engines on each inboard pylon. The cockpit profile was altered to make the 747 look like a prototype of an advanced airliner. The plane used can be seen on the BBC motoring programme Top Gear on the Test Track.
The sinking of the Venetian house at the climax of the film featured the largest rig ever built for a Bond film. For the scene involving Bond following Vesper into the house undergoing renovation supported by inflatable balloons, a tank was constructed at the 007 stage at Pinewood, consisting of a Venetian piazza and the interior of the three-story dilapidated house. The rig, weighing some 90 tons, incorporated electronics with hydraulic valves which were closely controlled by computer because of the dynamic movement within the system on its two axes. The same computer system also controlled the exterior model which the effects team built to one-third scale to film the building eventually collapsing into the Venetian canal. The model elevator within the rig could be immersed in 19 feet (5.8 m) of water, and used banks of compressors to strictly regulate movement.
At the time of filming, Aston Martin were still in the final phases of designing the DBS. The scene involving the car crash was devised using an Aston Martin DB9 that was especially modified to look like Bond's Aston Martin DBS V12 and reinforced to withstand the impact. Due to the low centre of gravity of the vehicle, an 18-inch (450 mm) ramp had to be implemented on the road tarmac at Millbrook Proving Grounds and Adam Kirley, the stunt driver who performed the stunt, had to use an air cannon located behind the driver's seat to propel the car into a roll at the precise moment of impact. At a speed exceeding70 mph (113 km/h), the car rotated seven times while being filmed, and was confirmed by the Guinness Book of Records on 5 November 2006 as a new world record.

Music:
The soundtrack of Casino Royale, released by Sony Classical on 14 November 2006, featured music composed by veteran composer David Arnold, his fourth soundtrack for the Bond film series, while Nicholas Dodd orchestrated and conducted the score. Producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli announced on 26 July 2006 that Chris Cornell, then-former lead singer of Soundgarden and former lead singer of Audioslave, composed and performed the title song, "You Know My Name". The song's main notes are played throughout the film as a substitute for the James Bond theme, to represent Bond's youth and inexperience. The classic theme only plays during the end credits to signal the climax of his character arc.

Release:
Casino Royale premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square, the Odeon West End and the Empire simultaneously in London on 14 November 2006. It marked the 60th Royal Film Performance and benefited the Cinema & Television Benevolent Fund (CTBF), whose patron, Queen Elizabeth II, was in attendance with the Duke of Edinburgh. It is the third James Bond premiere that the Queen attended following You Only Live Twice and Die Another Day. Along with the cast and crew, numerous celebrities and 5,000 paying guests were also in attendance with half the proceeds benefiting the CTBF.
Only two days following the premiere, pirated copies appeared for sale in London. "The rapid appearance of this film on the streets shows the sophistication and organisation behind film piracy in the UK," said Kieron Sharp, from the Federation Against Copyright Theft. Pirated copies of the DVD were selling for less than £1.57. Craig himself was offered such a DVD while walking anonymously through the streets of Beijing wearing a hat and glasses in order to avoid being identified.
In January 2007, Casino Royale became the first Bond film ever to be shown in mainland Chinese cinemas. The Chinese version was edited before release, with the reference to the Cold War re-dubbed and new dialogue added during the poker scene explaining the process of Texas Hold'em, as the game is less familiar in China (this addition is reminiscent of dialogue that was added to the 1954 American TV adaptation in order to explain the rules of baccarat, the game featured in the original book). Casino Royale earned approximately $11.7 million in China since its opening on 30 January on 468 screens, including a record opening weekend collection for a non-Chinese film, with $1.5 million.
After critics dubbed Die Another Day "Buy Another Day" because of around 20 product placement deals, Eon limited their promotions for Casino Royale. Partners included Ford Motors, Heineken Pilsener(which Eva Green starred in adverts for), Smirnoff, Omega SA, Virgin Atlantic Airways and Sony Ericsson.

Box office:
The film has earned $599,045,960 worldwide. Casino Royale was the 4th highest-grossing film of 2006, and was the highest-grossing instalment of the James Bond series until Skyfall surpassed it in November 2012. United Kingdom and Ireland
Upon its release in the United Kingdom, Casino Royale broke series records on both opening day—£1.7 million—and opening weekend—£13,370,969. At the end of its box office run, the film had grossed £55.4 million, making it the most successful film of the year in the UK, and as of 2011, the tenth highest-grossing film of all time in the country. United States and Canada
On its opening day Casino Royale was on top with $14,741,135, and throughout the weekend grossed a total of $40,833,156, placing it second in the ranking behind Happy Feet ($41.5 million). However,Casino Royale was playing in 370 fewer cinemas and had a better average ($11,890 per cinema, against $10,918 for Happy Feet). It earned $167,445,960 by the end of its run in North America, marking what was at the time the highest grossing film of the series, before being surpassed by Quantum of Solace's $168.4 million. Other markets
On 18 November 2006, Casino Royale opened at the first position in 27 countries, with a weekend gross of $43,407,886 in the non-US / Canada / UK & Irish markets. The film held the opening weekend record in India, taking in over $3,386,987, which was the highest for a foreign language film at the time. The film retained the top spot at the worldwide box office for four weeks.

Home media:
Casino Royale was simultaneously released on DVD, UMD and Blu-ray Disc on 16 March 2007. In the UK, Casino Royale was released on 16 March 2007 on DVD and Blu-ray Disc. The DVD and Blu-ray Disc releases broke sales records: the Region 1 Blu-ray Disc edition became the highest selling high-definition title to date, selling more than 100,000 copies since its release. The region 2 DVD edition achieved the record of fastest selling title for its first-week release. The UK DVD has continued to sell well, with 1,622,852 copies sold since 19 March. A copy of the Blu-ray Disc edition of Casino Royalewas given out to the first 500,000 PAL PlayStation 3 owners who signed up to the PlayStation Network. The DVD release includes the official music video for the film, and three documentaries detailing how Daniel Craig was chosen for the role of Bond, the filming, and an expanded version of the Bond Girls Are Forever documentary incorporating new interviews with Casino Royale cast members.
A three-disc edition of Casino Royale on DVD was released in the United Kingdom on 31 October 2008, coinciding with the cinema release of the sequel, Quantum of Solace (the following week in the United States). As well as features present from the 2007 release, the collector's edition contains an audio commentary, deleted scenes, featurettes and a storyboard-to-film comparison. A two-disc Blu-ray version also followed in late 2008, featuring additional supplementary materials, enhanced interactivity through BD-Live, and the previous version's 5.1 PCM soundtrack was replaced with a similar 5.1 Dolby True HD soundtrack.

Cuts and censorship:
Casino Royale was censored for its release in Britain, Germany and the United States. In Britain, the film received BBFC 12 rating after omitting some of LeChiffre's sadism and James Bond's reactions in the torture scene. In the United States, two fight scenes were censored to achieve a PG-13 rating: the fight between Bond and the traitorous MI-6 Agent's contact Fisher, and the fight between Bond and Obanno in the stairway at the Casino Royale. The German edit of the film cuts a sequence where the bomb-planter at the airport breaks a man's neck, instead replacing it with an alternate take. The mainland Chinese cut of the film also trims the torture scene and the stairway fight, as well as a shot of Bond cleaning his wound at the hotel and a boat scene. The fully uncensored versions can be found on the Australian, Dutch, French, Hong Kong, Japanese, and Scandinavian Blu-rays and DVDs, and on more recent editions of the UK release (rated 15).

Reception Reviews:
Critics gave the film a positive response, in particular Craig's performance and credibility. During production this had been subject to debate by the media and the public, as Craig did not appear to fit Ian Fleming's original portrait of the character as tall, dark and suave. The Daily Telegraph compared the quality of Craig's characterisation of Bond to Sean Connery's and praised the script as smartly written, noting how the film departed from the series' conventions. The Times compared Craig's portrayal of the character to that of Timothy Dalton, and praised the action as "edgy", with another reviewer citing in particular the action sequence involving the cranes in Madagascar. Critics Paul Arendt of BBC Films, Kim Newman of Empire and Todd McCarthy of Variety all described Craig as the first actor to truly embody Ian Fleming's James Bond from the original novel: ironic, brutal and cold.
The film was similarly well received in North America. MSNBC gave the movie a perfect 5 star rating. The film was described as taking James Bond "back to his roots", similar to From Russia with Love, where the focus was on character and plot rather than the high-tech gadgets and visual effects that were strongly criticised in Die Another Day. Rotten Tomatoes gave the movie an aggregate rating of 95%, the highest rating for a wide-release of the year. It is the fourth-highest rating for a Bond film on the site behind Goldfinger which received a 96%, From Russia with Love which received a 96%, and Dr. No, with a 98% score. Metacritic gave the movie a Metascore of 81, signifying "Universal Acclaim." Entertainment Weekly named the film as the fifth best of the series, and chose Vesper Lynd as the fourth best Bond girl in the series. Some newspaper columnists and critics were impressed enough by Craig's performance to consider him a viable candidate for an Academy Award nomination. Roger Ebert gave the film a four out of four star rating, the first for any of the James Bond films he reviewed. Ebert wrote that "Craig makes a superb Bond ... who gives the sense of a hard man, wounded by life and his job, who nevertheless cares about people and right and wrong," and that the film "has the answers to all my complaints about the 45-year-old James Bond series," specifically "why nobody in a Bond movie ever seems to have any real emotions." Time Out New York's Joshua Rothkopf called Craig "the best Bond in the franchise's history," citing the actor's "crisp, hateful, Mamet-worthy snarl ... This is a screwed-up Bond, a rogue Bond, a bounder, a scrapper and, in the movie's astoundingly bleak coda, an openhearted lover."
Vicky Allan of the Sunday Herald noted Bond himself, and not his love interests, was sexually objectified in this film. A moment where he rises from the sea is reminiscent of Ursula Andress in Dr. No; he feels "skewered" by Vesper Lynd's criticism of him; "and though it would be almost unthinkable now have a female character in a mainstream film stripped naked and threatened with genital mutilation, that is exactly what happens to Bond in [the film]." So although the film backed off from past criticism of Bond girls being sex objects, "the once invincible James Bond becomes just another joint at the meat market." This sentiment is shared by the University of Leicester's James Chapman, author of License to Thrill, who also notes Craig's Bond is "not yet the polished article"; he felt his incarnation of Bond is close to Fleming's because he is "humourless," but is also different because "Fleming's Bond did not enjoy killing; Craig's Bond seems almost to relish it."
Andrew Sarris of The New York Observer wrote that this particular Bond film is "the very first that I would seriously consider placing on my own yearly 10-best list. Furthermore, I consider Daniel Craig to be the most effective and appealing of the six actors who have played 007, and that includes even Sean Connery."
Roger Moore wrote, "Daniel Craig impressed me so greatly in his debut outing, Casino Royale, by introducing a more gritty, unrefined edge to the character that I thought Sean might just have to move over. Craig's interpretation was like nothing we'd seen on screen before; Jimmy Bond was earning his stripes and making mistakes. It was intriguing to see him being castigated by M, just like a naughty schoolboy would be by his headmaster. The script showed him as a vulnerable, troubled, and flawed character. Quite the opposite to my Bond! Craig was, and is, very much the Bond Ian Fleming had described in the books – a ruthless killing machine. It was a Bond that the public wanted." So impressed was Moore that he chose to buy the DVD. Raymond Benson, the author of nine Bond novels, called Casino Royale"a perfect Bond film."
However, the film met with mixed reactions from other critics. Rob Gonsalves of eFilmCritic.com gave the film a positive review, but commented, "When you strip the 007 films down for action and 'realism,' you lose the soul of those old beloved Bond movies – they might as well be Jason Bourne movies." John Beifuss of The Commercial Appeal said, "Who wants to see Bond learn a lesson about ego, as if he were Greg Brady in his 'Johnny Bravo' phase?" Anthony Lane of The New Yorker criticised the more imperfect and self-aware depiction of the character, saying, "Even James Bond, in other words, wants to be 007."
Though American radio personality Michael Medved gave the film three stars out of four, describing it as "intriguing, audacious and very original ... more believable and less cartoonish, than previous 007 extravaganzas," he commented that the "sometimes sluggish pacing will frustrate some Bond fanatics." Similarly, a reviewer for The Sun praised the film for its darkness and Craig's performance, but felt that "like the novel, it suffers from a lack of sharpness in the plot" and believed that it required additional editing, particularly the finale. Commentators such as Emanuel Levy concurred, feeling the ending was too long, and that the film's terrorist villains lacked depth, although he praised Craig and gave the film a B+ overall. Other reviewers responded negatively, including Tim Adams of The Observer who felt the film came off uncomfortably in an attempt to make the series grittier.
The sequence with Craig sporting swimming trunks topped the sexiest male celebrity poll of The Sun, and in 2009 Del Monte Foods launched an ice lolly moulded to resemble Craig emerging from the sea. In 2008, Entertainment Weekly named it the 19th best film of the past 25 years.

Top ten lists:
The film appeared on many critics' top ten lists of the best films of 2006.
1st – Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly
3rd – Empire
3rd – Marc Moha, The Oregonian
3rd – Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com
3rd – William Arnold, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
7th – Jack Mathews, New York Daily News
8th – James Berardinelli, ReelViews
8th – Desson Thomson, Washington Post
8th – Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune
9th - Andrew Sarris, The New York Observer
9th – Stephen Hunter, Washington Post
10th – Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune
10th – Mike Russell, The Oregonian

Accolades:
At the 2006 British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards, Casino Royale won the Film Award for Best Sound (Chris Munro, Eddy Joseph, Mike Prestwood Smith, Martin Cantwell, Mark Taylor), and the Orange Rising Star Award, which was won by Eva Green. The film was nominated for eight BAFTA awards, including the Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film of the Year; Best Screenplay (Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, Paul Haggis); the Anthony Asquith Award for Best Film Music (David Arnold); Best Cinematography (Phil Meheux); Best Editing (Stuart Baird); Best Production Design (Peter Lamont, Simon Wakefield); Best Achievement in Special Visual Effects (Steve Begg, Chris Corbould, John Paul Docherty, Ditch Doy); and Best Actor (Daniel Craig). This made Craig the first actor ever to receive a BAFTA nomination for a performance as James Bond. He also received the Evening Standard British Film Award for Best Actor.
Casino Royale won the Excellence in Production Design Award from the Art Directors Guild, and singer Chris Cornell's "You Know My Name" won the International Press Academy Satellite Award for Best Original Song. The film was nominated for five Saturn Awards— Best Action/Adventure/Thriller Film, Best Actor (Daniel Craig), Best Supporting Actress (Eva Green), Best Writing (Purvis, Wade and Haggis) and Best Music (David Arnold). The 2006 Golden Tomato Awards named Casino Royale the Wide Release Film of the Year. Casino Royale was also nominated for, and has won, many other international awards for its screenplay, film editing,] visual effects, and production design. At the 2007 Saturn Awards, the film was declared to be the Best Action/Adventure/Thriller film of 2006. Several members of the crew were also recipients of 2007 Taurus World Stunt Awards, including Gary Powell for Best Stunt Coordination and Ben Cooke, Kai Martin, Marvin Stewart-Campbell and Adam Kirley for Best High Work.