Mini-Review: Quantum of Solace

Just got back from watching "Quantum of Solace," the most recent James Bond film of the Daniel Craig era. First reaction: gee, the cars in James Bond movies sure are prone to...exploding. If you shoot them, they explode. If you run into them, they explode. If you try to drive one without wearing your seatbelt, they...well, you get the picture.

In fact, the whole world of "Quantum of Solace" seems to be suffering from the worst case of explode-itis that I've seen outside of an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. Sure, the cars blow up, but so do planes, boats, and building. They do so randomly, without explanation; the director seems to think that the only way to ratchet up the excitement is to toss in a couple pillowy fireballs. Fittingly, the movie's final showdown takes place within a desert resort that transforms, quite abruptly and without explanation, into a gigantic stick of TNT.

I called out the director in the last paragraph. Time to call him out again. The man--whoever he is, and I refuse to look up his name--has no idea what he's doing. First of all, he made the rookie mistake of entrusting the camera and editing work to a gang of epileptics. The average scene during chases and fights clocks in at roughly .5 seconds, while the longest lasts no more than .75. Everything is just an incomprehensible jumble of gunshots, explosions, kicks, punches, and grunts. It doesn't help matters that every male character, good and bad, looks damn near identical. They're all big, hulking men with short scrubby hair and grizzled, chiseled faces.

The lone exception is the villain--whose name I also refuse to look up, on the grounds that if he were really a good villain I wouldn't have to look it up--who is some Eurotrashy weenie who schemes to take over 60% of Bolivia's water supply. Whoa, momma! Move over, Dr. Evil! Next thing you now, that dastardly megalomaniac will try to buy up the electric company, so that anytime somebody lands on his utilities they'll have to pay 10 times the number shown on the dice. And after that--the B&O railroad! Bwa ha ha ha!

What made "Casino Royale" such a great movie, and such an exhilirating reboot, was that it simplified and clarified the whole Bond formula. Gone were the gadgets, the cartoonishly complicated plots, the pointless globe-trotting. Well, they're baaaaack! "Quantum of Solace" resucitates everything that made the old Bond films unwatchable. Daniel Craig's Bond has been transformed from a complicated--if blunt--individual into a Jack Baueresque killing machine. Judi Dench's M exists as much for comic relief as anything else. And the Bond girl is...well, I never quite got her deal. Something about getting revenge on some tin-pot Bolivarian dictator? Not the stuff of high drama.

In conclusion..."Quantum of Solace" isn't very good. In fact, it isn't good at all. In fact, it's pretty bad. I spent most of the movie's second half thinking about the delicious slice of pumpkin and chocolate cake waiting for me at home. Assuming, of course, that it hadn't exploded before I got there.