Revenge-crazed Bond Gets Quantum Physical

By Adam Pope November 27, 2008 Issue

In 2006, director Martin Campbell exposed us to new breed of Bond—a stoic, brooding assassin with a ruthlessness that the character had never achieved before. In short, James Bond was stripped of the quips, smirks and gadgets of the past and rebuilt with more intensity and longer action sequences to show off his new physicality. The second chapter in the storyline of this rebooted Bond, Quantum of Solace, hands the reigns over to Marc Forster, director of Monster’s Ball, Stranger than Fiction and The Kite Runner. None of these pictures are riddled with the kind of action sequences that accompany 007 on his escapades, but what Forster lacks in action expertise he redeems in scenes saturated with emotional intensity. Daniel Craig makes his return as the only blue-eyed Bond with enough gusto to leap from a moving car and enough machismo to suffer no real damage afterwards, and the iconic Judi Dench is back for one more go around as MI6’s ultra rational leader M.

The plot finds us ultimately tying up the few untidy loose ends left at the end of Casino Royale, with Bond hot on the trail of those behind the murder of his deceased flame, Vesper Lynd. At the start of the film, we see an iconic car chase between the agent—in his pristine Aston Martin, which quickly turns to Swiss cheese—and the bodyguards of Mr. White, whom Bond nabbed at the end of his previous caper. After a quick and lethal interrogation, the villains are identified as a mysterious organization carrying the enigmatic moniker Quantum. Bond embarks on his signature one-man demolition crew mission to bring the criminals to justice and leave the world comfortably back in the debt of Britannia. Along the way, he joins forces with Bolivian secret agent Camille (Olga Kurylenko)—possibly the most boring name in 007’s history—to assist her in settling her own scores with the globe spanning secret organization.

The film takes off with a frantic pace of action and espionage, which is relentless and nerve-wracking. Craig is once again phenomenal as a Bond who is not crippled by his reliance on wisecracks and being forced to charm his way out of situations. It’s much more efficient to simply mow down the bad guys and wait for someone else to come in and clean up the mess. Quantum ratchets up the action to a level that has never been equaled before in any Bond film, with not one, not two, but three incredible chase scenes that are beautifully shot and executed, and Craig pulls off the dangerous side of James Bond. He is a hired killer after all, better than any actor in the franchise’s long history. But there is a price to pay for all of that adrenaline.

The film is simultaneously handcuffed by this blind devotion to thrills and chaos as the film becomes one elongated action shot saturated in vengeance and tempered in anger. This isn’t the James Bond that the world has fallen in love with over the years. It is understandable that Forster wants to reinvent the hero as less dependent on gadgets, but the beloved gadget master Q has been completely nixed as has Bond’s innuendo-soaked relationship with Moneypenny, also is curiously absent from the latest films. These characters are absolutely cemented to the Bond world, and for them to be missing causes the film to ring a little hollow. And the characters that do exist seem to be becoming more and more ordinary. Gone seem to be the days of Goldfinger and Dr. No—even Casino Royale gave us a menacing villain who cried blood when he became rattled. The main villain in this film? Dominic Greene, a wealthy eco-activist with secret desires for political control of Bolivia. The character feels a bit boring after being placed in the context of a franchise with a massive reputation for memorable baddies.

All in all, Quantum of Solace has enough thrills and explosions to introduce an entire new age bracket to the world of MI6 and its irreplaceable lead wolf. Daniel Craig’s Bond is so fascinating that longtime Ian Fleming fans will still be able to slurp down the film like a perfectly shaken martini.

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