This uncut version has kicked around on home video for some time, finally coming to the US in the recent 4K home release of director Martin Campbell’s 2006 blockbuster. International Top Five - Casino Hits Trip Aces. December 6th, 2006. A slow week for Casino Royale with only four openings, and only one of those in a major market. In Japan the film had to settle for second place with $2.34 million on 443 screens over the weekend and $3.25 million in total; this was a tiny margin behind local film, Love and Honor.

Doug Liman 'doesn't know how to process' 'Casino Royale' mimicking the tone of 'The Bourne Identity'.

The 55-year-old director helmed the 2002 action thriller and admits it was 'surreal' when the 2006 Bond movie took inspiration from his flick as he had dreamt of helming a movie featuring the iconic spy.

Doug said: 'I always wanted to make a James Bond movie but they don't hire American directors. By the way, you've made two little indie movies. You're never going to direct James Bond.

'I went and made 'Bourne Identity', and then after 'The Bourne Identity' came out, the next James Bond to come out was 'Casino Royale', which totally copied the tone of Bourne. I had a very surreal thing where I was sort of making Bourne because I really wanted to make Bond, and then Bond copied Bourne.'

The 'Locked Down' director added: 'I didn't quite know how to process that. I still don't know how to process that. I don't know if I got what I wanted or didn't get what I wanted.

'It's beyond my computing power to know how to feel about that. It's probably an unsatisfying answer. To say I'm annoyed or flattered would be easy, but I'm still confused about how should I feel this.'

Doug also recalled how he put his foot down to ensure that Matt Damon's Jason Bourne fought off a smaller number of enemies in the film's concluding scenes.

He told Slash Film: 'It's still one of my favourite mementos from my career. Universal told me the ending would be unsatisfying, and they wanted Jason Bourne to fight 200 people. I told the two executives to go eff themselves. Unfortunately, one of those executives now runs Netflix. I'm still proud of having sent that memo.'

How difficult can it be to make a good poker scene in a movie? According to James Bond director Martin Campbell the ‘Casino Royale’ remake poker showdown was as elaborate as any stunt 007 was involved in!

The 2006 movie grossed a monster $606million at the box office, with Daniel Craig’s ‘Bond’ and Mads Mikkelsen’s blood-eyed villain ‘Le Chiffre’ involved in the highest stake poker game of all time.

For poker fans, of course, seeing their beloved game depicted on the big screen is almost always more ‘miss’ than ‘hit’, so how did director Campbell manage to produce such an intense facsimile of a real highstakes game?

“What you realize is, it’s not just the card games — it’s the stakes. It’s also two guys eye-fucking one another, basically. That was the secret,” explained to Polygon.com.

With No Limit Hold’em replacing the Baccarat Chemin de Fer of the Ian Fleming book version, and the 1967 movie version…

Watch Casino Royale

…the cast and crew had to be taught the game basically from scratch to ensure everything from continuity to poker tells would come across as realistically as possible.

Not an easy task for poker consultant Tom Sambrook, the 2002 winner of the European Championships explaining:

“I’d just basically tell them what the absolute bare minimum was that they needed to know to look like they had been playing this game.”

Sambrook also admits to making a bit of money on the side, taking the actors for their ‘per diem’ in hastily-arranged games in the studios.

The Englishman, who finished ahead of Hendon Mobster Barny Boatman and EPT legend John Duthie to win his title, explained:

“We’d be playing games constantly between takes,” adding cheekily, “I saw it as their privilege to learn by paying me this money.”

Director Campbell somehow pulled together all the elements of the game in an almost believable series of poker scenes, mixed in with the usual action-packed adventures of a typical Bond movie.

Casino Royale Movie

He believes the 30 minutes of gameplay that made the final cut, showing three massive hands, was critical to the success of the film, admitting:

Casino Royale 2006 Full Movie

“It was the thing I sweated on more than anything else.”

After discovering Le Chiffre’s ‘tell’, Bond has to survive two assassination attempts in his bid to end the villain’s hopes of winning the $130million poker game.

“From a dramatic point of view, each of the card games has a good climax,” says Campbell, and if the final scene still grates with some poker fans, there is a reason.

The four-way all-in sees Le Chiffre’s full house lose to Bond’s straight flush, with most fans expecting a Royal Flush to win the day for the movie hero.

“He wins with an inconspicuous straight flush, rather than the royal flush,” Sambrook says, adding to Director Campbell’s vision of a “new Bond” , a less flashy, more believable hero.

Check out the finale yourself!

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