I don't claim to be one of those people who knows everything about James Bond. I don't think I have even seen more than five or six Bond films, and these are mostly the newer ones. But despite my limited knowledge, I was very excited to see that with Casino Royale, the 007 franchise was given a much-needed breath of fresh air.The film, as probably everyone knows, stars Daniel Craig as the new Bond. He is blond, buff, and beautiful. Unlike his predecessors, he doesn't rely on technological gadgets to get the bad guys, but rather on his huge and perfectly-defined muscles. With animal-like agility, he runs and he wrestles, he hangs from crates and bounces from walls. The energy which he exudes is unlike anything I've seen in the movies in a long time and makes the movie belong entirely to Craig.
Casino Royale does away with the tired cliches that had identified Bond for the past few decades. Charming and novel at first, these idiosyncrasies seem trite and out of place nowadays. When asked if he wants his drink shaken or stirred, Craig responds brusquely, "Does it look like I give a damn?" The movie replaces the Bond conventions and gives free reign to Craig to create a completely different persona. And he does a great job at that. The James Bond of this movie is a very complete character. Every look, every word, every movement is congruent with the whole. Bond partially lets you into his psyche, his motivations, making you feel like he is an actual human being who happens to be a spy, rather than a recycled caricature of a spy. At the same time he manages to maintain an air of mystery and impenetrability that keeps him compelling and attractive. A significant part of this new characterization of Bond is that he is now a far more sexualized character. I mean that he is both sexual in the way the old Bond was-- ie: a man who is good with the ladies-- but also in the sense that he has become a sexual object himself. And I think that is wonderful and shows a very cosmopolitan and refreshing take on gender relations.
In a related note, I felt the movie had a strong homo-erotic under current. There was no explicitly gay content but there were aspects of certain scenes that were reminiscent of elements of gay culture. The sexy banter between Bond and Vesper, for example, seemed to suggest that Bond has an acute self-awareness of his own physical beauty and sex-appeal in a way that is both charming and narcissistic. Another example is the torture scene where Le Chiffre beats a naked Bond, which seems just one or two degrees removed from an elaborate S&M porno that ought to be performed by bearded men in leather chaps.
The rumor floating around the Internet is that in his next Bond flick, Craig wants there to be more daring elements, like explicit homosexual content and full-frontal nudity. Kudos to Craig, and to director Martin Campbell for catching up with the times.
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One of the other interesting aspects about this film's place in the Bond canon (disclosure: this is the only Bond film I've seen in its entirety!) is that it is technically a prequel. "Casino Royale" was the very first Bond novel that Ian Fleming wrote. You'll notice that the film version begins with Bond before he receives 00 status (the license to kill). I agree that Craig's Bond is much tougher, more restless and pugilistic than previous Bonds. He's a cocky rookie recently promoted and he takes risks that the more seasoned Bonds would not take. What's nice about the movie is that his recklessness sometimes reuslt in him getting bruised and beaten -- at cards or in a fight. This Bond is fallible, he's learning along the way. He's also learning about women and one gets this sense from the end of his affair with Vesper Lind that her betrayal will irrevocably scar Bond, and make him distrustful of all women from here on out.
One can see how the story (set mostly in a luxurious casino) could easily have been set in the 1950s. It's been updated with reference to global terrorism and 9/11 and use of text messages but essentially it works in an old-fashioned context, too. How interesting that though this Bond comes after Connery and Brosnan and all the rest he also comes "before" them in the sense that he's showing the formation of the Bond archetype. When Judi Dench was introduced a few years back as "M" she was a new updating element, but now she is the old guard and Craig's Bond is new...
And, finally, you're absolutely right about the homoerotic element in the film. The camera caresses Craig in the way that it usually caresses the Bond girl (compare Craig rising out of the water with the fmaous shot of Halle Berry in a swimsuit a few years back). Craig's is the first (for lack of a better word) "fuckable" Bond. He's not purely dominant/masculine but is also an object of the sexual gaze (as when Vesper comments on his "perfectly-formed ass" -- emphasizing his anus, the locus of male penetration). Craig creates an ambisexual Bond. The character has been brought up to date, as you say, especially in terms of the relatively recent trend in fashion photography to show the unclothed male body more and more as an object of desire. It's now much more common to see men in mass media depicted as the "fuckers" and the potentially fucked. Craig seems refreshingly comfortable with both of these roles.
He's also really, really hot.
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