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November 28th 2006
Poker Film Review: Casino Royale
Casino Royale, the newest James Bond movie, has recently hit UK cinema screens, and after the Queen herself, along with a few other celebs, caught the premiere screening, the rest of us “normal folk” got to have a go. And we loved it.
Now this is no film review website, so besides confirming that yes, this certainly is one of the best ever Bond films, I’ll just get straight to the point: the poker. First off I should point out that the poker in Casino Royale is more than just a time wasting exercise before Bond gets back to the 9 to 5 business of preventing nuclear war and bedding other people’s wives. After all, the film is called “Casino Royale”.
No, the poker in this Bond film is essential to the plot of the film. Bond must win a (very) high stakes poker game in order to….., well, I don’t want to give it away now do I? Let’s just say that if Bond loses it’s bad for MI6 and world peace, and if Bond wins it’s bad for baddies and terrorists and evil plans for world domination.
On the whole the poker is fairly well done. In particular it is well acted, with the players behaving as you would expect poker playing multi-millionaires to behave. There are however a few problems. First of all there are no obvious professional poker players at the table. Wouldn’t you think that in a poker game with $150 million up for grabs someone would have staked the likes of a Phil Ivey to have a shot?
Still, that said, maybe the bad guys hosting the game sensibly decided this wouldn’t be in their best interests. So we can let that go. But then we move on to the next problem and it’s the same problem that has marred every poker scene in every film or television program since the dawn of time.
Why oh why can no director ever resist the temptation to make every featured poker hand one in which every competing player has a bloody monster!? It drives me nuts. You’ll see what I mean when you watch the final hand of Casino Royale, though that hand is just one of many laughably improbable scenarios. Think “The Cincinnati Kid” but even more absurd.
For the love of God what’s wrong with someone calling a bet with a draw? What’s wrong with someone getting lucky? And how about seeing the money going in before the river? You almost never see a poker scene where the players get their money in before the last card has been dealt, and yet as any play knows, more often than not the money goes in on the flop or turn.
There is at least one nice play when Bond plays a losing hand in order to get a read on his opponent, but there should have been more play like this. I spoke to a female friend of mine who had scene the film, and she confirmed to me that for her the entire poker scene was like watching a Japanese quiz show, proving that even if every hand features a full house versus four of a kind it will still be mumbo jumbo to people who don’t know about poker!
That said, the poker is entertaining, and the setting and peripheral elements are good. Overall it works, but the die hard poker fan will be disappointed. That said, the die hard Bond fan will be back for a second viewing the next day!
Submitted: 28/11/2006 11:27:03
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