Quantum of Solace (12A.)
Directed by Marc Forster.
Starring Daniel Craig, Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Amalric, Judi Dench, Gemma Arterton, Jeffrey Wright. 107 mins.
Hose down those expectations and approach Bond 22 with a Modicum of Caution. It’s a disappointment but it’s not the heart trampled on the floor betrayal Indy 4 was.
Quite simply it doesn’t live up its title. Quantum of Solace is a great Bond title, brimming with arrogance and confidence – our new Bond is so good we can call his films any damn silly nonsense we like. But the film doesn’t follow up that swagger.
At the end of Casino Royale - Craig standing on an Italian lakeside, AK-47 in hand having just earned the right to say The Line “Bond, James Bond,” - there seemed to be no limit to where this 007 could go; the world really was not enough.
Instead, QOS sees the series trying to slowly edge back towards what it knows. There’s a surface coating of grit but this is still a loosely plotted travelogue stringing together lots of improbable action sequences, just like all the others. They even introduce a new Spectre style secret organisation. A few minor alterations and it could comfortably have had Pierce Brosnan as Bond.
It’s meant to be a direct sequel to Casino Royale (it starts on the day CR ended) but you don’t feel a connection with the previous film. Responding to criticism that CR was 20 minutes too long they’ve made a Bond film that is 15 minutes too short (though it doesn’t feel brisk.)
Of course all the poker stuff in Casino Royale was a drag but it made you feel as if you’d earned the action sequences, like it was a proper story. QOS is simply unrelenting, and unvarying, action with plot and character motivation hastily squeezed in during the rest breaks.
The opening car chase is fantastic, swiftly edited and filmed up close. But very quickly you realise that every set piece is going to be just like that. There’s an imaginative sequence at a performance of Tosca but mostly the film is one intensive brutal, intimate fist fight after another. How on earth did the Bourne movies become templates for Bond?
It’s not a bad Bond but it’s not one of the special ones. Mid to lower mid table I’d say. Marc Forster (Finding Neverland, Kite Runner) is probably the most distinguished director to be given a Bond. He’s also German and the big theme in Quantum is that you can’t trust anyone. Just maybe he’s a double agent enacting Auric Goldfinger’s revenge; “I don’t expect you to die Mr Bond, I expect you to become a pale imitation of a pale imitation.”
Directed by Marc Forster.
Starring Daniel Craig, Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Amalric, Judi Dench, Gemma Arterton, Jeffrey Wright. 107 mins.
Hose down those expectations and approach Bond 22 with a Modicum of Caution. It’s a disappointment but it’s not the heart trampled on the floor betrayal Indy 4 was.
Quite simply it doesn’t live up its title. Quantum of Solace is a great Bond title, brimming with arrogance and confidence – our new Bond is so good we can call his films any damn silly nonsense we like. But the film doesn’t follow up that swagger.
At the end of Casino Royale - Craig standing on an Italian lakeside, AK-47 in hand having just earned the right to say The Line “Bond, James Bond,” - there seemed to be no limit to where this 007 could go; the world really was not enough.
Instead, QOS sees the series trying to slowly edge back towards what it knows. There’s a surface coating of grit but this is still a loosely plotted travelogue stringing together lots of improbable action sequences, just like all the others. They even introduce a new Spectre style secret organisation. A few minor alterations and it could comfortably have had Pierce Brosnan as Bond.
It’s meant to be a direct sequel to Casino Royale (it starts on the day CR ended) but you don’t feel a connection with the previous film. Responding to criticism that CR was 20 minutes too long they’ve made a Bond film that is 15 minutes too short (though it doesn’t feel brisk.)
Of course all the poker stuff in Casino Royale was a drag but it made you feel as if you’d earned the action sequences, like it was a proper story. QOS is simply unrelenting, and unvarying, action with plot and character motivation hastily squeezed in during the rest breaks.
The opening car chase is fantastic, swiftly edited and filmed up close. But very quickly you realise that every set piece is going to be just like that. There’s an imaginative sequence at a performance of Tosca but mostly the film is one intensive brutal, intimate fist fight after another. How on earth did the Bourne movies become templates for Bond?
It’s not a bad Bond but it’s not one of the special ones. Mid to lower mid table I’d say. Marc Forster (Finding Neverland, Kite Runner) is probably the most distinguished director to be given a Bond. He’s also German and the big theme in Quantum is that you can’t trust anyone. Just maybe he’s a double agent enacting Auric Goldfinger’s revenge; “I don’t expect you to die Mr Bond, I expect you to become a pale imitation of a pale imitation.”
