Quantum of Solace

Bond is running wild. The honest data disk to Casino Royale, which lags in the ability to operate independently. The scenario moves into a more classic dimension, James' emotional hesitation remains credible, I immensely enjoy the action, and above all, Daniel Craig loses the look of a wild beast who has been given a license to kill and behaves like an elephant in a china shop. Bond keeps killing, but with style, elegance, and I must say, with a certain sinful pleasure. The Bond girl (the classic one) is here briefly, but exactly as the fans want her to appear. Beautiful, slightly annoying, but in the consequences of James' deadly charm, also helpless. In Olga's portrayal, Camille is an equal partner, although she cannot fulfill the ancient fate of Vesper by principle. And the main hero remains seemingly insensitive machine that won't back down. During the screening shortly after watching the previous escapades of Quantum, the motivation or credibility of the villains gradually runs out, but in the face of scenes like the deadly edited Austrian cat-and-mouse game, it doesn't fall behind much. (11/11/2008)

007's character was never one I had to have on a poster above my bed, and he could name the proportions of all the women who had slept with him. Still, I have always appreciated how "trendy" he can be, not only in terms of dressing but also in filmmaking. The present is ruled by the brawlers on speed who solve problems with the elegance of a bulldozer, and this is exactly the category that James Bond had to conquer. He did it perfectly. We can argue about how much the plot would stand on its own without the previous poker kick-off, but Marc Forster goes much further. The hackneyed blockbuster rules are shattered, the characters behave erratically, and even the hero straddles the line where good meets evil so closely that it's hard to discern which one of them has the upper hand in his actions. Craig is brilliant, handling the torn emotions and the cold fights without blinking an eye, Amalric's villain oozes respect, and Olga is an elegant addition who fills her role to perfection. Forster's work is obviously not to everyone’s taste, but when I read criticisms about art, I shake my head in disbelief and boldly put Quantum of Solace on my personal list of top films. (11/11/2008)

What is apparent from its screenplay and its exposition of 007 is that this 22nd Bond movie was supposed to be a revenge-driven, ferocious and almost furious culmination of Casino Royale. And the producers entrusted it to the artsy director who amputated all of Casino Royale’s powerful limbs and arranged flowers in their place. All the great action, the Bond car and all the stylish opening credits and interesting locations are absent and the bad guys look like they stepped out of a Pasolini movie. The only thing that makes Quantum of Solace a Bond movie, what keeps it kicking and earns it a third star in my rating, is the still great Daniel Craig (Olga Kurylenko is nice, but she’s still just a female background character in Bond’s world). This is the first Bond movie after a very long time that didn’t make me feel that heroic excitement I used to feel after watching action movies as a little boy. (11/03/2008)

I’d say that the traditional martini is a thing of the past for the new Bond, Craig looks more like someone who sips energy drinks. When we left the cinema my friend said: “Mate, didn’t we make a mistake? Wasn’t this Hulk by any chance?“ We didn't, but the fact is that Bond's casualness, elegance, wit, insight and typical ironic puns have probably gone down the drain with the dashing Craig. To make an animal analogy, Bond has always been something of an easy-going German shepherd for me (with the exception of Dalton), while Craig's Bond is a purebred brawling pit bull. I'm not complaining, just stating dryly, but I'm not really enjoying this newly set Bond universe. That said, it was a pretty decent action flick. (11/17/2008)

After a calm, focused and full viewing, I am increasing my rating. My main gripe that he doesn't get into Bond's more elaborate motives has gone down the drain. Forster put exactly as much psychology in there as the story needed, and he hid Bond's inner rebirth dilemma in the second plan. Only a person dulled by the current popcorn production and who is unable to read between the lines can call 007 a terminator. If Campbell gave Her Majesty's agent the right to kill and a human heart, Forster stripped him of a clear world and a recipe for identifying good and evil. It's too bad that Dominic Greene has so little space on the screen. Amalric managed to portray him wonderfully without unnecessary overplaying - no longer as a clear villain, but as a guy who balances on the edge in a world where clear boundaries can no longer be drawn. Where he has to go to bed with the bad guys, because the good boys all died. And James? Is only his service really pushing him forward like the other Bonds? Hardly. However, by pure chance, the path of revenge coincides with the path of lesser evil (least amount of consolation). A well-chosen duet with the charismatic Kurilenko culminates in a double catharsis – one of the characters finds revenge, whilst the other apparently definitively finds himself. However, Forster certainly did not shoot any Casino Royale action film, which one will appreciate only after a careful viewing. For example, the fantastic interplay between Bond and Mathis, or the cute maternal relationship between M and 007, proves that Marc remained who he was and managed to bring intimate emotions and attention to detail into the story. The moment when the big world man Bond finds himself among the suffering Bolivian farmers is magnificent, because it thematizes Bond's pilgrimage from the untouchable Dandy to the proletarian slugger, who, in addition to suffering, is also able to see the consequences of his actions and the upheaval of so-called good in today's world. It is a sad paradox that perhaps the most intimately-conceived Bond production cost such a sum (it really is not visible, because Forster presents even the most effective action scenes as an aesthetic rhyme about many clever details and precise tempo). My impression is clearly positive. Quantum Of Solace is something like an intimate psychological action film, which works with unconventionally "high" resources within a typically "low" plot. The film feels much more thoughtful than wild. It is unfortunate that Forster did not get his extra 20 minutes, and thus he needed to force too much of a drastic edit into the otherwise very sensitive tone of the narrative. Thanks to the soundtrack, which goes even further below the surface and doesn’t bother with effective rumbling, I give it five stars. Not everyone will appreciate this Bond film, but from my point of view it is one of the best and certainly the one that most defies conventions. (10/23/2008)