Casino Royale

Casino Royale

Synopsis

After becoming a 00 agent, James Bond hunts down a bomb maker in Madagascar, which leads him to shady financier Alex Dimitrios in the Bahamas, and then to a plot to blow up the prototype Skyfleet airliner at Miami Airport. By preventing the bombing, Bond leaves criminal banker Le Chiffre on the verge of bankruptcy – Le Chiffre lost his clients’ money by betting on Skyfleet’s failure on the stock market. Le Chiffre sets up a high-stakes poker game in Montenegro to win back the lost money. Bond attends with Treasury agent Vesper Lynd and wins, but Le Chiffre kidnaps Lynd and tortures Bond in an attempt to regain the winnings. They are saved when Mr White, a senior figure in terrorist organisation QUANTUM, kills Le Chiffre. However, Lynd is secretly working for White and has made a deal with him to save Bond’s life. In love with Lynd, Bond resigns from MI6 and travels to Venice with her. There, he realises she has betrayed him and stolen the money. After a gunfight with QUANTUM’s men in a collapsing Venetian villa, Lynd lets herself drown because she cannot bear the burden of her guilt. Bond pursues White and shoots him in the leg, then introduces himself; “The name’s Bond, James Bond.”

Cast

Daniel Craig, Eva Green, Mads Mikkelsen, Judi Dench, Jeffrey Wright, Ginacarlo Giannini, Caterina Murino, Simon Abkarian, Isaach De Bankole, Jesper Christensen, Ivana Milicevic, Tobias Menzies, Claudio Santamaria, Sébastien Foucan, Malcolm Sinclair

Producers

Michael G. Wilson
Barbara Broccoli

Director

Martin Campbell

Release Date

16 November 2006 (UK)
17 November 2006 (USA)

World Premiere

14 November 2006, Odeon Leicester Square, London

Locations

Modrany & Barrandov Studios, Prague and Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic; New Providence and Paradise Island, Bahamas; Dunsfold Aerodrome, Black Park, Buckinghamshire; Pinewood Studios, England; Lake Como & Venice, Italy

Music

“You Know My Name” – performed by Chris Cornell, composed by Chris Cornell and David Arnold

Vehicles

Aston Martin DB5, Aston Martin DBS, Notar MD-600N helicopter, Skyfleet S570, Spirit 54 yacht, Sunseeker Predator 108, Texron tanker, Jaguar XJ8, Range Rover Sport, Ford Mondeo

Gadgets/Weapons/Technology

  • Walther PPK 7.65mm
  • Walther P99
  • Mobile phone tracker
  • Key fob detonator
  • Medipack located in the glove compartment of Bond’s Aston Martin DBS
  • Tracking device implant
  • Heckler & Koch UMP45 submachine guns
  • Heckler & Koch UMP9 9mm submachine gun
  • Le Chiffre’s knotted rope
  • Obanno’s machete
  • Backpack bomb
  • Nail gun

Trivia

Special permission was granted for Bond and Vesper’s yacht (the Spirit 54) to sail along the Grand Canal between the Accademia and Rialto bridges, marking the first time in many years a yacht has sailed the Grand Canal

Production designer Peter Lamont is the only crew member to have worked with all six Bond actors as well as working on more Bond films (18 out of 21) than anyone else

The effects team created an exterior Venetian house model, built to one-third scale, to shoot the building collapsing into the Venetian canal. The same computer system used to control the three story dilapidated interior set also controlled the model’s hydraulics so Corbould and his team could exactly replicate the motion of the interior set

Producer Michael G. Wilson has a cameo as a corrupt Montenegrin police chief

The Guinness World Record for the most cannon rolls in a car is seven and achieved by stuntman, Adam Kirley, in an Aston Martin DBS, during filming at Millbrook Proving Ground, Milton Keynes

The first Bond film not to include both Q and Moneypenny’s characters

The only Bond film to have a black and white pre-title sequence and not begin with the gun barrel sequence

Bond reveals the recipe for his favourite martini, ‘The Vesper.’

The bomb maker Mollaka, whom Bond pursues through the Nambutu Embassy, is played by Sébastien Foucan, the co-creator and one of the foremost practitioners in the art of Parkour, also known as “Free Running”

Casino Royale is the first Bond novel that Ian Fleming wrote but the rights were not available to EON until the year 2000

Oscar-winning costume designer Lindy Hemming dressed Vesper in red and made sure that none of the extras wore any red, so that we could see her as Bond catches glimpses of her through the crowds in Venice. It’s a small homage to Don’t Look Now

Trailer