Casino Royale (1967)

User Rating:

5.1/10   

Directors:

Val Guest
Ken Hughes
(more)

Writers:

Wolf Mankowitz (screenplay) &
John Law (screenplay) ...
(more)

Release Date:

28 April 1967 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Action | Adventure

Tagline:

CASINO ROYALE . . . the greatest JAMES BOND! 007 show on earth ! [Australian Daybill Movie Poster]

Plot:

In an early spy spoof, aging Sir James Bond (David Niven) comes out of retirement to take on SMERSH.

Plot Keywords:

James Bond | Spy | Baccarat | Retirement | Nephew

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 1 win & 2 nominations

Cast

Peter Sellers	...	Evelyn Tremble, James Bond-007
Ursula Andress	...	Vesper Lynd - 007
David Niven	...	Sir James Bond
Orson Welles	...	Le Chiffre
Joanna Pettet	...	Mata Bond
Daliah Lavi	...	The Detainer - 007
Woody Allen	...	Jimmy Bond - Dr. Noah
Deborah Kerr	...	Agent Mimi aka Lady Fiona
William Holden	...	Ransome
Charles Boyer	...	Le Grand
John Huston	...	McTarry - M
Kurt Kasznar	...	Smernov
George Raft	...	Himself
Jean-Paul Belmondo	...	French Legionnaire (as Jean Paul Belmondo)
Terence Cooper	...	Cooper, James Bond-007
Barbara Bouchet	...	Moneypenny
Angela Scoular	...	Buttercup
Gabriella Licudi	...	Eliza
Tracey Crisp	...	Heather
Elaine Taylor	...	Peg
Jacqueline Bisset	...	Miss Goodthighs (as Jacky Bisset)
Alexandra Bastedo	...	Meg
Anna Quayle	...	Frau Hoffner
Derek Nimmo	...	Hadley
Ronnie Corbett	...	Polo
Colin Gordon	...	Casino Director
Bernard Cribbins	...	Taxi Driver
Tracy Reed	...	Fang Leader
John Bluthal	...	Casino Doorman / M.I.5 Man
Geoffrey Bayldon	...	'Q'
John Wells	...	'Q's' Assistant
Duncan Macrae	...	Inspector Mathis
Graham Stark	...	Cashier
Chic Murray	...	Chic
Jonathan Routh	...	John
Richard Wattis	...	British Army Officer
Vladek Sheybal	...	Le Chiffre's Representative
Percy Herbert	...	1st Piper
Penny Riley	...	Control Girl
Jeanne Roland	...	Captain of the Guards
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Jennifer Baker	...	Le Chiffre's assistant (uncredited)
Susan Baker	...	Le Chiffre's assistant (uncredited)
R.S.M. Brittain	...	Sergeant Major (uncredited)
Erik Chitty	...	Sir James Bond's Butler (uncredited)
Frances Cosslett	...	Michele (uncredited)
Alexander Doré	...	Extra (uncredited)
Valentine Dyall	...	Vesper Lynd's assistant / Dr. Noah's voice (uncredited)
Hal Galili	...	USA Officer at Auction (uncredited)
Veronica Gardnier	...	Bond girl (uncredited)
Bob Godfrey	...	Scottish Strongman (uncredited)
Jack Gwillim	...	British Officer at Auction (uncredited)
John Hollis	...	Monk (uncredited)
Anjelica Huston	...	Agent Mimi's Hands (uncredited)
Burt Kwouk	...	Chinese General (uncredited)
John Le Mesurier	...	M's Driver (uncredited)
David Lodge	...	Bit Role (uncredited)
Yvonne Marsh	...	Bond girl (uncredited)
Barrie Melrose	...	Extra (uncredited)
Stirling Moss	...	Driver (uncredited)
Caroline Munro	...	Guard Girl (uncredited)
Peter O'Toole	...	Piper (uncredited)
David Prowse	...	Frankenstein's Creature (uncredited)
Milton Reid	...	Temple Guard (uncredited)
Robert Rowland	...	MI5 Agent (uncredited)

Directed by
Val Guest		(additional sequences) (scenes with Woody Allen and additional scenes with David Niven)
Ken Hughes		(Berlin scenes) (as Kenneth Hughes)
John Huston		(scenes at Sir James Bond's house) (castle in Scotland scenes)
Joseph McGrath		(scenes with Peters Sellers, Ursula Andress and Orson Welles)
Robert Parrish		(scenes with Peters Sellers and Orson Welles)
Richard Talmadge		(uncredited) (Casino Royale finale)

Writing credits
Wolf Mankowitz		(screenplay) &
John Law		(screenplay) &
Michael Sayers		(screenplay)
Ian Fleming		(suggested by the novel "Casino Royale")
Woody Allen		uncredited and
Val Guest		additional dialogue and
Ben Hecht		uncredited and
Joseph Heller		uncredited and
Terry Southern		uncredited and
Billy Wilder		uncredited and
Peter Sellers		uncredited

Produced by
Jerry Bresler	....	producer
John Dark	....	associate producer
Charles K. Feldman	....	producer

Original Music by
Burt Bacharach

Cinematography by
Jack Hildyard		(director of photography)

Film Editing by
Bill Lenny

Casting by
Maude Spector

Production Design by
Michael Stringer

Art Direction by
Ivor Beddoes
Lionel Couch
John Howell

Costume Design by
Julie Harris
Anna Duse		(uncredited)

Makeup Department
John O'Gorman	....	makeup artist: Ursula Andress
Joan Smallwood	....	chief hairdresser
Neville Smallwood	....	chief makeup artist

Production Management
Barrie Melrose	....	production manager
John D. Merriman	....	production manager (as John Merriman)
Douglas Peirce	....	production manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Roy Baird	....	assistant director
Carl Mannin	....	assistant director
Anthony Squire	....	second unit director
John Stoneman	....	assistant director
Richard Talmadge	....	second unit director

Art Department
Norman Dorme	....	assistant art director
Bill MacLaren	....	construction manager (as Bill Maclaren)
Terence Morgan	....	set dresser
Tony Rimmington	....	assistant art director

Sound Department
Sash Fisher	....	sound
Chris Greenham	....	sound editor
Bob Jones	....	sound
Richard Langford	....	sound (as Dick Langford)
John W. Mitchell	....	sound
Jim Shields	....	dialogue editor (as James Shields)

Special Effects by
Cliff Richardson	....	special effects
Roy Whybrow	....	special effects
John Richardson	....	special effects (uncredited)

Visual Effects by
Les Bowie	....	special matte work

Stunts
Gillian Aldam	....	stunts (uncredited)
Bob Anderson	....	stunts (uncredited)
Peter Brace	....	stunts (uncredited)
Ken Buckle	....	stunts (uncredited)
Jack Cooper	....	stunts (uncredited)
Tex Fuller	....	stunts (uncredited)
Rusty Hood	....	stunts (uncredited)
Arthur Howell	....	stunts (uncredited)
George Leech	....	stunts (uncredited)
Jimmy Lodge	....	stunt double: David Niven (uncredited)
Jimmy Lodge	....	stunts (uncredited)
Peter Munt	....	stunts (uncredited)
Richard O'Brien	....	stunt rider (uncredited)
Keith Peacock	....	stunts (uncredited)
Terence Plummer	....	stunts (uncredited)
Dinny Powell	....	stunts (uncredited)
Joe Powell	....	stunts (uncredited)
Nosher Powell	....	stunts (uncredited)
Mike Reid	....	stunt driver (uncredited)
Terry Richards	....	stunts (uncredited)
Tony Smart	....	stunts (uncredited)
Terry Yorke	....	stunts (uncredited)

Camera and Electrical Department
Nicolas Roeg	....	additional photography
John Wilcox	....	additional photography
Trevor Coop	....	camera trainee (uncredited)
Ted Deason	....	focus puller: "a" camera (uncredited)
Wally Fairweather	....	focus puller (uncredited)
Gerry Fisher	....	camera operator (uncredited)
Maurice Gillett	....	supervising electrician (uncredited)
Pamela Green	....	still photographer (uncredited)
Anthony B. Richmond	....	focus puller (uncredited)
Alex Thomson	....	camera operator (uncredited)
Douglas Webb	....	still photographer (uncredited)
Ken Worringham	....	camera operator (uncredited)

Costume and Wardrobe Department
Betty Adamson	....	wardrobe supervisor

Editorial Department
Alan Strachan	....	assistant film editor

Music Department
Burt Bacharach	....	conductor
Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass	....	main title theme played by (as Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass)
Jack Hayes	....	orchestrator (uncredited)
Leo Shuken	....	orchestrator (uncredited)

Other crew
David Berglas	....	technical advisor
Charles K. Feldman	....	presenter
Tutte Lemkow	....	choreographer
Richard Williams	....	titles and montage effects
Lord Bolton	....	stand-in: Sir James Bond in grouse shooting scenes (uncredited)
Renée Glynne	....	continuity (uncredited)
Michael Murray	....	runner (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Columbia Pictures Corporation
• Famous Artists Productions

Distributors

• Columbia Pictures (1967) (USA) (theatrical)
• Columbia Films (1967) (France) (theatrical)
• Columbia-Bavaria Filmgesellschaft m.b.H. (1967) (West Germany) (theatrical)
• Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) (1970) (USA) (TV) (original airing)
• RCA/Columbia-Hoyts Home Video (1983) (Australia) (video)
• BCI Eclipse (1989) (USA) (video)
• Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (1992) (USA) (video)
• Sony Video (1992) (USA) (video)
• 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment España S.A. (2001) (Spain) (DVD)
• 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (2001) (Australia) (DVD)
• MGM Home Entertainment (2001) (USA) (DVD)
• Columbia TriStar Home Video (1987) (USA) (VHS)
• LK-TEL Vídeo (Brazil) (VHS)
• RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video (USA) (VHS)
• RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video (USA) (laserdisc)

Other Companies

• Bermans, London  costumes: Ursula Andress and Joanna Pettet
• Chombert  acknowledgment: from Paris - furs for Ursula Andress
• Guy Laroche  acknowledgment: from Paris - Casino dresses
• Paco Rabanne  acknowledgment: from Paris - Guard Girl dresses

Also Known As:

Charles K. Feldman's Casino Royale
Casino Royale (Austria) (West Germany) [de]
Casino 007 (Hungary) [hu]
Casino Royale (France) [fr]
Casino Royale (Finland) [fi]
Casino Royale (Spain) [es]
Cassino Royale (Brazil) [pt]
James Bond 007 - Casino Royale (Denmark) [da]
James Bond 007 - Casino Royale (Italy) [it]
James Bond 007 - Casino Royale (Greece) [el]

Runtime:

131 min

Country:

UK | USA

Language:

English | French

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

70 mm 6-Track (Westrex Recording System) (70 mm prints) | Mono (35 mm prints)

Certification:

Canada:PG (Manitoba/Ontario) | Iceland:12 | Canada:A (Nova Scotia) | Canada:G (Quebec) | Australia:PG (DVD/video rating) | USA:Approved (certificate #29446) | Germany:12 (f) (re-rated) | West Germany:16 (f) | Brazil:14 | Austria:16 | Finland:K-12 | France:U | Spain:T | Sweden:11 | UK:PG | Singapore:PG | UK:U (original rating)

Filming Locations:

County Galway, Ireland

Company:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Trivia:

Sir James Bond's favorite composer was Claude Debussy, whose piece 'Claire De Lune' can be heard in the movie.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: When the pod from the flying saucer "drives" up out of the water in the underground dock, the cable pulling it is plainly visible near the bottom of the screen.

Quotes:

Bacillus Box: ...Handle these capsules with care. Dr. Noah's bacillus is highly contagious. This germ, when distributed in the atmosphere will make all women beautiful and destroy all men over 4'6". Please handle these capsules with care.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in James Bond 007: Yesterday and Today (1996) (V)

Soundtrack:

The Look Of Love

An experiment that didn't quite work

Casino Royale has some outstanding elements. The production design is worth a 10. There are beautiful, often provocatively dressed or relatively undressed women everywhere you look. Many of its segments are funny; it's even occasionally hilarious.

The problem arose in putting all of it together. And with at least five directors and at least ten writers, it's not difficult to see why. The whole is a mess. There is little in the way of overarching plot. Most threads are just completely abandoned after awhile.

The story, which is very loosely based on Ian Fleming's James Bond novel Casino Royale (published in 1953--it's the first Bond novel), is a spoof of the typical adventure featuring the infamous secret agent. The real Bond (David Niven) went into retirement when his skills were at their peak. This Bond is quite different than the Bond we know--he is almost chaste, he's a homebody, he dedicates each evening's twilight to playing Debussy on the piano, and so on. Casino Royale has it that the Bond we know from other films is a decoy.

A group of older men, representing the secret agencies of the US, the UK, Russia and France, are on their way to the real Bond's home to ask for his assistance. It seems that someone has been trying to wipe out as many secret agents as they can. While they're pitching the idea of coming out of retirement to Bond, they're attacked. Bond's house is blown up, and he (implicitly) agrees to the assignment. Casino Royale is the story of the real Bond trying to get to the bottom of the sinister agent-wipeout plan. Part of carrying that out involves changing the identity of nearly every spy to James Bond--if the real Bond is to work unimpeded, he can't always be worrying about being killed by the criminal mastermind.

Each director worked on a different segment in relative isolation from the rest. This went so far as having their own portions of the script written. The problem was that despite Eon Productions (the production company behind most of the Bond films) not owning the rights to Casino Royale, they had used many of the "bits" in other Bond films. So there wasn't much of the book left to adapt. In addition, it was felt that a serious alternative Bond film couldn't compete against the Albert R. Broccoli/Harry Saltzman-produced films. So Casino Royale producers Jerry Bresler, John Dark and Charles K. Feldman had different writer/director teams create their own, parodic Bond segments that would be loosely tied together--it was almost a filmic version of the "Exquisite Corpse" game, in which you fold a piece of paper so that you can't see other persons' work, and you have to continue the drawing on your section with only a couple visual anchors.

Each segment features a different set of stars--the primary sets centering on Niven, Woody Allen, and Peter Sellers with Ursula Andress and Orson Welles. Those are all great actors, and great comedians in at least two cases. They all do a bit of their own schtick--in some cases, they demanded this. Woody does his neurotic New York Jew character, Peter Sellers rides the gray area between bumbling buffoon and suave playboy, with a couple generic Indian and Chinese impersonations thrown in for good measure, Orson Welles does his best Paul Masson Wine-pitching "elder statesman" demeanor, and also throws in a few of his more famous magic tricks. All of this stuff is good, but does it work as a unified film? No. And if that's not enough evidence for you, consider that the segments were further chopped up into set-pieces. There's the "M", or McTarry funeral stuff, the Niven car chase stuff, the Sellers/Andress romance stuff, and so on. Each set piece ends up being largely independent--you could almost see this as a series of skits on a similar theme. These facts make Casino Royale not quite work. It's certainly no match for a legitimate Bond film, despite the similarity of location-hopping, outrageous villains, spy gadgets and so on.

But, in isolation, the segments tend to be good to excellent. The stretch with Bond visiting the faux M widow is probably the funniest. It also presages the Sir Robin section of Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), but bests it in a way, if only because of its extension. The madcap ending of the film is a lot of fun for its embrace of absurdism as a supreme aesthetic disposition--and it may have even influenced some later films. And the segments with the trippiest visuals, both in the climax, are a fantastic treat for any fan of surrealism. They're good enough to watch the film just to see them. The production design is incredible throughout the film. Not just for the surrealism, but the lush Edwardian and Victorian interiors, complete with copies and works in similar styles to unique, influential artists such as Gustav Klimt and Otto Dix.

If we felt like being overly generous, we might be able to argue that the overarching mess of a plot was part of the point. This is a spoof of Bond, after all, and Bond novels and films tend to have sprawling plots--both geographically and narratively. We do travel to many exotic locales, meet many exotic people, doing exotic things, and we receive many plot intricacies and twists in both the typical Bond story and in Casino Royale. However, Bond films aren't quite convoluted or messy enough to deserve this kind of spoofing, so excusing the messiness of the whole to parodic intent seems an over-ambitious stretch.

Casino Royale is worth seeing, particularly if you're a big Bond fan or a big fan of any of the cast, or even if you just like a lot of late 1960s/early 1970s big, madcap comedies. Just don't expect anything like a tight story.