He's back. Bond. James Bond.

Double-oh seven himself.

In Die Another Day. Opens tomorrow. In theaters everywhere.

Why am I writing like this?

Don't know.

Maybe 'cause it's how they talk in the trailers. Clipped. Dramatic.

The legend continues. Pierce Brosnan. Halle Berry. In the greatest Bond movie of them all!

Die ... Another ... Day.

OK, enough of that. You could go crazy writing that way. But the fact is, I'm a huge James Bond fan. Have been since I was a kid in the early '60s and nearly singed my corneas watching Ursula Andress wade out of the surf in that shimmering white bikini in Dr. No, the very first Bond movie.

To men of a certain age - if you have to ask what age, you're too young to understand - Bond has always been the epitome of cool.

The martinis shaken, not stirred, the crisp white dinner jackets, the high-stakes baccarat in glittering Monaco casinos, the women, the cars, the adventures all over the world - this guy knew how to live.

Bond represented eternal youth, a life with few responsibilities save looking for the next good time. He sure as hell wasn't changing diapers at 2 in the morning or caulking the bathtub on weekends or speeding to Blockbuster at 9:55 on a Sunday night to return a Robin Williams video.

Bond lived a perfect fantasy life. And who among us, spooning strained peas into the toothless yap of a wailing baby or cleaning a small mountain of dog throw-up from the living room carpet, didn't yearn for a little fantasy?

So tomorrow, I'll plop myself down in some darkened theater with my giant tub of popcorn and trash-barrel-sized Pepsi and $15 bag of M&M;'s to watch Die Another Day, the 20th Bond film of the past 40 years.

From the teaser trailers, I see that Bond, as played by Pierce Brosnan, still looks like a million bucks despite all he's been through.

And let's face it, the bad guys have put Bond through a lot.

They've thrown him in shark tanks.

They've handcuffed him to ticking A-bombs.

They've strapped him to tables with powerful lasers inching toward his groin.

They've locked him in airtight rooms and pumped in cyanide gas.

They've left him tied up in the cockpit of burning jet planes nose-diving at 500 mph.

They've shot him, stabbed him, tried to kill him with tarantulas and flaming shish-kebabs and exploding desserts.

And the guy still looks great! Youthful. Vigorous. Not a day over 40.

Me, I've got none of his stress. Worst thing that happens to me is a yearly prostate exam. And I look like I'm 102. Gray hair, bags under my eyes, I'm a wreck. I don't know how Bond does it.

In Die Another Day, Bond uncovers the requisite plot to take over the world by the requisite evil megalomaniac, this one named Gustav Graves.

(Tell me something: Why do these arch-villains always want to take over the whole world? Why can't they ever settle for, you know, just a country? Or even a continent?)

The Bond babe this time is Halle Berry, who apparently appears in one riveting scene in a belted orange bikini the size of a Kleenex, said to be a tribute to Ursula Andress' famous surf scene in Dr. No.

Unlike the Bond babes of the past - your Pussy Galores, your Honey Ryders, your Mary Goodnights, etc. - Berry's character is not given an outrageously over-the-top name.

In fact, her character's name is so understated as to induce sleep: Jinx.

Yep, that's it: Jinx. Don't ask me why. At this point, I have no details.

Nor do I have details on the bad-guy flunkies that the evil megalomaniac will send out to battle Bond, although we can only hope they're as memorable as, say, Oddjob, who wielded his razor-brimmed derby in Goldfinger, or the 7-foot-2-inch Jaws with his trash-compactor teeth in The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker.

Still, my favorite arch-villain henchman (henchperson?) of all time remains Col. Rosa Klebb, the prune-faced crone with the infamous stiletto-toed boots in From Russia With Love.

Whether popping assassin Red Grant (played by Robert Shaw) in the gut with brass knuckles to test his fitness or slashing at Bond with her shoes in a Venice hotel room at the film's end, Klebb radiated pure evil.

Unfortunately, she was also indirectly responsible for one of the all-time worst groaners in a Bond movie.

After Bond babe Tanya Romanova (played by Daniela Bianchi) saves 007 in the hotel room by shooting and killing Klebb, Romanova shudders and says: "A horrible woman."

To which Bond replies: "She's had her kicks."

OK, so the man has a tin ear for jokes.

With everything else, he's still smooth as velvet.