Stormbreaker (Geoffrey Sax, 2006)

I imagine Charlie Higson's junior James Bond novelisations might actually be worth filming for the teenage demographic, instead of this clone. But do teenagers need an age-tailored version anyway, when the real deal is hardly adult entertainment? Any 12-year-old should be content with the cartoonishness of Live and Let Die. And then there's always Harry Potter for the younger ones.
So, in retrospect it's not hard to see why this bombed at the box office, aborting plans for a sequel dynasty: it falls between too many stools. There's an angelically good-looking boy hero who vies with Hayden Christensen for acting prowess (Christensen's fall-back being sulky tantrums; Alex Pettyfer just looks tranquilised), a helicopter seemingly permanently stationed above London for swooping panoramic shots to remind potential tourist visitors to come and check it out, and a galaxy of British acting stalwarts from Nighy to Coltrane, Serkis, Okonedo and Fry to lure parental guardians in, their characters equipped with nudge-wink Bond references. Rourke, Silverstone and McGregor are in there too, presumably just because the budget was too and you can't be too careful these days when trying to set up an international franchise. The action is ADHD-paced and the plot fills about half a napkin, leaving the boy spy to jump over things, perform improbable martial arts and press buttons on cool gadgets.
In short, it's crap.

3/10