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I like the action scenes and the chase across the rooftops of Siena os one of my favourites of the series. You can’t zone out with his action scenes or you will miss something. The whole film requires concentration at all times. Forster does excel at other touches such as art direction and an eye for colour and locale. The performances by the cast are launched off a canvass using a distinctive colour palette of blacks and whites, blues and the warm earth tones of beiges, browns and terra cotta reds. The film is a work of art disguised as a blockbuster.
Olga Kurylenko as Camille Montes is also very good. Fleming had been experimenting with physically and emotionally challenged female characters and Camille is the hub at which the spokes of Melina Havelock, Honeychile Rider and Holly Goodhead meet. She’s a very rounded character who carries emotional and physical scars and her going after Medrano is the secondary driving force. It’s right that she doesn’t sleep with Bond because that would have cheapened the character – and somehow wouldn’t have fitted
South America is a character here. I love Forsters evocation of seedy La Paz, a desert inhabited by indigenous peoples and a party in a sweaty villa on the edge of town. You can almost smell the Latin world with this film. There is an establishing shot of a large reptile moving slowly around a rock under a burning sun – a scene Fleming could have described quite vividly on page one of his stories. The last set piece at the terra cotta coloured hotel amid the dunes of the desolate wastes of the 'Bolivian' desert adds atmosphere and lighting not easily captured on the Pinewood back lot.
Quantum of Solace proves that by removing and reshuffling traditional elements, the franchise is not ruined, nor is it any less of a Bond film. By doing so, the series has received a shot to the arm and it feels like anything could happen. The producers can go in any direction. If people want the same old same old, they have the pre 2006 films. Usually the series is criticized for being formulaic and predictable; here fresh ideas and a new way of going about things thrive. I hope this stance continues with the remainder of Craig’s era.
I truly believe that is the most underrated of the Bond films, and is quite frankly, a little masterpiece.
but now// i see what a masterpiece it is!
craig's performance.. just incredible.
the editing and style of the movie is mind-blowing and original!
some great and unusual shots.
i suggest slowing the film down in places to appreciate it more (particularly the opening and the bregenz scene).
Some criticisms this film has received in the past bemuse me though. Confusing plot, for example. Really?!? I found it rather straight forward. Another one is the excessive action scenes. I just dont buy this. Last time i watched it i measured the time between the boat battle and the next action set-piece, the DC3 battle and it ended up being approx. 30 minutes give or take 5. I can except criticism of most things...unless its completely unfounded.
However, i do find the editing a bit jarring.
CR has the madagascar chase, the miami airport chase and venice...thats only two less (negative a substantial PTS that we'd become accustomed to), for a film i wont even bother saying is quite superior in many ways. However, on the action film front, QOS shouldnt be criticised for having too much action when you compare it to its rivals in the genre.
Just an observation but aggrevation seems to be happening a lot recently across a few threads. This is Bond utopia folks, lets enjoy living in it. :-)
Talking of crescendos...the Tosca scene could possibly be the most beautiful and most dramatic scene throughout the entire series. A real masterstroke in a hugely underestimated entry.
Firstly, we spend a LOT more time with Fields in QoS than we did with Jill Masterson in GF, and she is a far more sympathetic character. I'm not saying that Jill deserved to die, but she was an accomplice of Goldfinger, helping him cheat at cards, for money. She chose to work with this villain, and it was pretty short sighted of her not to expect repercussions when be betrayed him (not willingly, but she must have been with him long enough to know how he thinks).
By contrast, Fields is a younger, less-worldly office worker who has been roped in to escorting a fellow agent onto a plane. Even if she knew going to the Greene Planet party carried some risk, but I don't think she really comprehended what would happen if she caught the attention of Quantum. To be honest, I don't think Bond did either.
Secondly, when the audience meets her, she's annoying, dressed very strangely (for the weather) and has a cut-glass accent that's quite grating. However, she end's up making the ultimate sacrifice in what must have been a terrifying final hour(s) of her life. Jill must have been unconscious when the gold was applied to her, to have died from skin suffocation (which as we all know is impossible to die from, anyway). For Fields, I imagine that she was very much alive while being tortured for information, and then drowned in oil. The image of her, black as night in a spotless white room, isn't strangely beautiful like the golden girl of GF, but messy, grim and disturbing.
Bond is also clearly affected by her death: his mission of vengeance for Vesper has directly caused the death of Mathis, and now Fields. In GF, it doesn't seem to register nearly as much with Bond.
And with that, I've just put on the QoS DVD! This thread has definitely caused me to re-appraise it! Cheers!
@DaltonCraig007 having just finished watching it again, you're right about the screen time! I had forgotten just how little she was in it. However, I still feel more affected by her death than, say, Solange who died in similar circumstances in CR.
I like the secondary characters, Mathis and Camille are great allies, the locations are nice and throughout there are some awesome action scenes and a nice retro Bond vibe, like this coulda been made in the 60's. And I love Felix Leiter in this, he is coming into his own and I really hope he is back for Bond 23.
No Bond sucking-on-fingers this time around was appreciated as well.
And Bond's boozing on the plane was well done. Those drinks looked real tasty.
That's about it.
I will say this about Quantum, it does sucessfully go ahead with the idea of Bond not getting with Camile at the end. This, I agree, compliments the character more. However IF they wanted to have Bond shag Camile they could have done it somewhere earlier in the film and maybe made it look rather cold and un-romantic (i.e. show Bond and Camile in a hotel bedroom talking seriously about Greene's upcoming party as they put on their clothes). In fact I think I would have rather seen that than the sequence with Fields, and Craig trying to act like he was Sean Connery.
As for Bond bedding Camille instead of Fields I don't think it would have worked IMHO. Bond bedding Fields was about being able to manipulate her into helping him and showed that he used her as a tool, leading to more guilt about her death. With Camille it would have been more about two adults having a NSA fling, which Bond wasn't ready for because he hadn't let go of Vesper yet (and good on the filmmakers for going there - I think it will play extremely well once we watch, say, 4 of Craig's films in a row 20 years from now).
You could even have had Camile die and then have Bond avenge both her and her parents at the end by killing the general. Bond would have felt guilty about using an already vulnerable girl to fulfill his own selfish sexual desires and that would have spurred him on. I suppose that would be pushing things a bit though.
Just an idea.