Monday, November 12, 2012

Casino Royale

Following the assassination of M (John Huston), an aging James Bond (David Niven) is coaxed out of retirement to once more thwart the evil forces of SMERSH, and instead decides to send his nephew James Bond (Peter Sellers) who himself must contend with a series of agents, opponents, and villainesses also named James Bond. When Columbia Pictures held the movie rights to Ian Fleming's premier film instead of  Eon, the studio which has produced most of the other 007 films, they opted to make a goofy spy spoof mashup instead of trying to contend with the lauded series. Employing no less than 6 directors and 10 writers, which inexplicably features the likes of Huston, Woody Allen, Ben Hecht, and Billy Wilder, "Casino Royale" is an incomprehensible mess which only serves as a curio for its sometimes amusing cameos which include Allen, Huston, Orson Welles, and Peter O'Toole.