The Podge Cast

QUANTUM OF SOLACE
Studio: Sony Pictures
Director: Marc Foster
Starring: Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Amalric, Giancarlo Giannini

Plot: Taking place literally minutes after the events of Casino Royale (best 007 movie ever), Quantum of Solace leads James Bond (Daniel Craig) on a path of revenge against those who wronged him and those he cared about. Along the way, Bond discovers a secret organization that is bigger and deeper than he’d ever imagined. This is terrible for him, but great for the audience, as it opens up endless lines of cannon fodder henchmen for 007 to lay the smack down on.

Review: I’ll start with the title. Many people were a little confused by what ‘Quantum of Solace’ exactly means, so let’s break it down for the ignorant masses, shall we? ‘Quantum’ is an ancient Latin word used by the Gecko-Romans to describe the utilization of cars, boats, motorcycles, and planes. ‘Solace’ is a word that loosely translates from its original French or Mexican as “to fracture the skulls of those who dare even look at you the wrong way.” So, based on title analysis, the film is about James Bond using fast things with motors to kill a whole bunch of evil people wearing suits. Beyond that, if the vehicles don’t finish the job, he always uses the personal touch of a gun or a fist. Rock on. Doesn’t get much better then that, especially considering there were actually scenes near the end of Casino Royale where Bond played kissyface on the beach with some girl and talked about relationships. This sequel could have been called ‘Autumn Breaths of Cedar Passion’ or some such crap. We must count our blessings.

You’ll see my score at the bottom only gets a 7 though, as I have to be an honest critic. As much as I enjoyed the movie, two things stood out from making this the greatest motion picture of our time. The first problem is that the movie broke an important action movie rule – each successive action sequence should be bigger than the previous one, yielding a massive, shit-your-pants, epic ending - hopefully ending up in space, regardless of the validity of such a situation. The ending of the movie rocked, but did not match the intensity of the first half hour, making you feel a little let down. The second problem is the editing of the action sequences. There are way too many quick edits and overuse of the shaky cam. You have these incredible sequences that you can’t fully appreciate because you’re not allowed to see all of it. (This is a problem I’ve been seeing in many recent action films.) Despite that, there are some seriously awesome stunts and plenty of excitement! As a sidenote, I’ve never been the ‘cultured’ type, but if ballet was described as people fighting on ropes in construction zones, I’d buy a fucking ballet season pass. 

My minor gripes don’t make it a bad movie though. It’s a more concise film in terms of story, but logically expands on past events and forces 007 to think about the consequences of some of his actions. Above all else, it’s great follow up to Casino Royale and paves the way for plenty of future Bond fun.

Quantum of Solace gets 7 out of 10 GoldenEye cartridges for the Nintendo 64.