GERMANY: The stars turn out for the German Premiere of the new James Bond film, Casino Royale, with tributes to legendary director Robert Altman

US actor Daniel Craig was in Berlin on Tuesday (November 21) for the German premiere of the new James Bond film, 'Casino Royale'. Delighting the hundreds of screaming fans with his appearance, Craig put on a brave face about losing the race at the US box office to the cartoon penguins from the film, 'Happy Feet'. Where James Bond villains Goldfinger and Blofeld failed, the animated penguins got the better of Agent 007 in an unusually tight race at the box office in North America. According to studio estimates, "Happy Feet" earned 42.3 million U.S. dollars during its first three days of release across the United States and Canada, while the latest James Bond movie 'Casino Royale' pulled in 40.6 million U.S. dollars. "Oh I am not bothered about that, it's fine, look you know, we got the movie out, it's a good film, it's not my business," Craig said at the Premiere. The villain in the new Bond film, Danish Mads Mikkelsen also took the defeat lightly for a 'bad guy'. "Damn, well, I've got to get them later then. It's fine, I like penguins." Craig said playing Bond was a bigger feat, 'Casino Royale' is his first outing as the suave superspy, it its based on Ian Fleming's novel of the same name, the first book in his 'James Bond' series. "It's a challenge, it's a huge responsibility and I just wanted to make it the best film we could and that is what we set out to do and I think we sort of, I think we've achieved making it a pretty good movie." 'Casino Royale' introduces James Bond before he holds his license to kill, and follows his elevation to '00' status. Bond's first 007 mission takes him to Madagascar, where he is to spy on a terrorist, but not everything goes to plan and Bond decides to investigate independently of MI6, in order to track down the rest of the terrorist cell. Following a lead to the Bahamas, he encounters Dimitrios and his girlfriend, Solange (Caterina Murino), and learns that Dimitrios is involved with Le Chiffre (Mads Mikkelsen), banker to the world's terrorist organizations. Secret Service intelligence reveals that Le Chiffre is planning to raise money in a high-stakes poker game in Montenegro at Le Casino Royale, and MI6 assigns 007 to play against him, knowing that if Le Chiffre loses, it will destroy his organisation. Bond and the government money he is entrusted to play the game with are placed under the watchful eye of Vesper Lynd, who becomes the first Bond-girl, who is to shape the James Bond forever. The director Martin Campbell said at the premiere that Craig fitted the Bond role perfectly. "Well the quintessential Bond character is someone who has all the, like the martini, has all those great ingredients of his character; which are, you know incredibly, he's good looking, he's sexy, he's suave, he wears a tuxedo brilliantly, he seduces women effortlessly. You know what he is: who every man wants to be and who every woman wants to go to bed with." On a sadder note, the cast and crew of 'Casino Royale' paid tribute to cinema legend Robert Altman who died in Los Angeles on Monday. "It's sad, I mean, well he had a long beautiful life and he achieved a lot of things, I mean that's the way it goes when you are 81. So I hope everything goes well and the family can gather round him and say goodbye in a proper way," Mads Mikkelsen told Reuters. "What a great director, such an eclectic director, a man who has done so many different styles, different types of movie," said Martin Campbell. "And of course his own unique style, when he had, in any one scene you could have eight people, all talking at the same time, and you could absolutely understand what everybody was saying and doing. Very very clever, a wonderful director. And also as a personality, I did meet him two or three times, and what a nice man. And so, you know, it is a great loss to cinema I think." In the US the domestic opening was down considerably from the 47 million USD bow of the previous Bond film, 2002's 'Die Another Day,' which ended up with 161 million. But Columbia said the opening compared favourably with Pierce Brosnan's 007 debut 'GoldenEye,' which started with 26.2 million USD in 1995 and finished with 106 million. (Sales are not adjusted for ticket price inflation.)

ITN Source | November 23, 2006

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