Casino Royale is a 2006 spy thriller film, the 21st instalment in the James Bond series by Eon Productions, the third film adaptation of Ian Fleming’s 1953 novel of the same name, and the first to feature Daniel Craig as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond.
The second film in the series was directed by Martin Campbell, written by Neil Purvis, Robert Wade and Paul Haggis, and stars Eva Green, Mads Mikkelsen, Judi Dench and Jeffrey Wright. The film follows Bond on a mission to bankrupt terrorist financier Le Chiffre (Mikkelsen) in a high-stakes poker game at the Casino Royale in Montenegro.
MI6 agent James Bond receives a “license to kill” and is promoted to 00 after assassinating the traitorous MI6 director Dryden and his contact in Prague. In Uganda, Mr. White introduces Steven Obanno, a commander of the Lord’s Resistance Army, to Le Chiffre, an Albanian private banker specializing in terrorism. Obanno offers Le Chiffre $100 million to invest. Using information about his upcoming terrorist attack on aerospace manufacturer Skyfleet, Le Chiffre short-sells the company’s shares. In Madagascar, Bond destroys an embassy while capturing and then killing a bomb-maker named Mollaka. MI6 director M criticizes Bond for causing an international incident and ignoring her orders to capture Mollaka alive.
Information from Mollaka’s phone leads Bond to the Bahamas and a meeting with corrupt Greek official Alex Dimitrios, who hires Mollaka to bomb Skyfleet’s prototype aircraft at Le Chiffre’s request. After winning Dimitrios’ vintage Aston Martin in a poker game and seducing his wife, Solange, Bond pursues Dimitrios to Miami. Bond fights off an attack by Dimitrios and kills him.
At the airport, Bond pursues Dimitrios’ new bomber and prevents the destruction of Skyfleet’s aircraft. With Skyfleet shares in his hands, Le Chiffre loses Obanno’s money. Realizing that someone has exposed the terrorist plot, Le Chiffre tortures Solange to death. To recover his clients’ money, Le Chiffre organizes a Texas Hold’em tournament at the Casino Royale in Montenegro. MI6 enters Bond, the agency’s best poker player, into the tournament, believing that if he loses, Le Chiffre will have to seek asylum with the British government in exchange for information about his client. Bond is paired with Vesper Lynd, a British Treasury agent overseeing the $10 million investment.
They meet their contact, French secret service agent RenΓ© Mathis, in Montenegro. Obanno, furious at losing the money, threatens Le Chiffre, but allows him to continue playing to get his money back. Obanno and his bodyguard attack Bond, and Bond kills both. Bond loses the $10 million bet after Le Chiffre’s confession is exposed. Vesper refuses to offer another $5 million for Bond to continue, but another player and CIA agent Felix Leiter bets the money on Bond in exchange for the CIA’s arrest of Le Chiffre. Le Chiffre’s lover, Valenka, poisons Bond’s drink, but Vesper saves him. Bond returns to the game and wins. Le Chiffre kidnaps Vesper to trap Bond and takes them to an abandoned ship. He tortures Bond to force him to reveal the password to the bank account holding his winnings, but Bond resists. Mr. White breaks in and kills Le Chiffre, but spares Bond and Vesper.
Bond wakes up in hospital and recovers with Vesper by his side. He arrests Mathis, believing he has informed Le Chiffre. Bond falls in love with Vesper and resigns from MI6, and the two sail to Venice. When M reveals that her winnings were never transferred to the British treasury, Bond realizes that Vesper has betrayed him. He tracks her to a money exchange, where gunmen find him and capture her inside a ruined Venetian palace under restoration and supported by large flotation devices.
Bond destroys the flotation devices, causing the palace to tilt and sink into the Grand Canal, and kills the gunmen. Vesper is trapped in an ancient elevator shaft as it sinks. Bond dives into the canal to save her, but she locks herself in to stop him. Bond then attempts to resuscitate her but is unsuccessful, and Mr. White escapes with the money. M informs Bond, who has returned to duty, that the organization behind Le Chiffre[n 1] has threatened to kill Vesper’s lover unless she becomes a double agent. When Bond denounces Vesper as a traitor, M argues that she may have made a deal with White in exchange for Bond’s life. Realizing that Vesper left her phone to help him, Bond checks his contacts and finds Mr. White at an estate on Lake Como. He shoots White in the leg and introduces himself: “My name is Bond, James Bond”.
