Quantum of Solace (2008)
d. Mark Foster; pr. Michael G. Wilson, Barbara Broccoli; scr. Paul Haggis, Neal Purvis, Robert Wade; pr. Roberto Schaefer; m. David Arnold; ed. Matt Chese, Richard Pearson; cast. Daniel Craig, Mathieu Amalric, Olga Kurylenko, Jeffrey Wright, Dame Judi Dench, Giancarlo Giannini (106 mins)
Beginning with a spectacular car chase, the new Bond film Quantum of Solace is a fast paced follow-up to Casino Royale.
Indeed in many respects it’s the perfect follow-up: this is Bond at his most efficient and ambiguous and in a plot that promises to relaunch the classic trappings of Cold War Bond for the War on Terror. After the wayward Brosnan era escapist fantasies, Bond was finally back on track with Daniel Craig in Casino Royale and in Quantum of Solace the actor validates the casting choice to perfection – rugged elegance and ruthless seduction combine to make Craig a Bond to reckon with.
Daniel Craig plays Bond here for the second time in what is an effective re-launch of the Bond series for the War on Terror in the introduction of what may be the most important plot thread to develop so far in the recent Bond franchise. Craig’s Bond here spends as much time with his three-piece suit dishevelled as a result of intense action sequences as he did playing poker in Casino Royale. Indeed, Quantum of Solace is a good 40 minute shorter than its predecessor, making it one of the shortest running time Bond films in recent memory, and with a quick pace thanks to director Mark Foster who keeps things slick and accomplished with stylish aplomb.
Quantum of Solace begins with Bond and MI6 being made aware of a new super-criminal organization, the details of which are kept vague throughout the film. However, one thing is certain – after the independent villains of the past few Bonds, Quantum of Solace seeks to introduce to the Bond franchise the potential post War on Terror equivalent of the Cold War super-criminal organization SPECTRE (the “T” in which stood for “terrorism” though as profit rather than ideological expression): Quantum.
Indeed, this is where Quantum of Solace succeeds admirably as a modern Bond film – it has the quick pace, the slickness and in the re-application of the SPECTRE mythos, the awareness of the traditional beginnings of the series as applied to the new Bond, Craig. In that it continues the sense of introduction that came with Bond’s first mission in Casino Royale.
Globetrotting from Siena, Italy to Port Au Prince, Haiti to Bregenz, Austria to La Paz, Bolivia Bond here is essentially a detective, entrusted with rooting out as much as possible about the mysterious organization – his discovery of suave Mathieu Amalric fronting a seemingly benevolent environmental agency being a modern re-launch of the discovery of SPECTRE in Dr. No though with Craig a cold-hearted Bond with some of the vicious streak that Timothy Dalton brought to his more intense Bond in the final films of director John Glen’s decade-long run on the Bond films. Bond’s trail here eventually leads to new Bond girl Olga Kurylenko and her relationship to the well-mannered psychotic Amalric, a Quantum operative intent on destabilizing world governments, as seems to be the agenda of the fully reborn SPECTRE that is now QUANTUM.
The narrative has a few threads of continuity with Casino Royale, although it is the theme of revenge which here dominates – whether or not Bond will stay on the job or pursue revenge for the death of Casino Royale’s Bond girl, Vespa, whose memory seems to overcome Bond even doing his duty.
In that, Bond’s sublimated desire for vengeance is in Quantum of Solace paralleled with and for a while displaced onto the new Bond girl Kurylenko, who seeks revenge against a Bolivian dictator implicated in deals with Quantum and who once murdered her family and raped her mother. The parallel between the revenge-driven Kurylenko and the revenge-sublimating Bond sustains the latter half of the film after a stylish and highly intense sequence during a performance of Tosca.
Much is made of Bond’s insomnia in Quantum of Solace, his determined resolve, driven by either duty or revenge the film leaves ambiguous; perhaps its both, hence the attraction he sees in Kurylenko although, in a curious and tender aside with recurring actor Giancarlo Giannini is there the hint of a Bond looking for forgiveness within himself – for caring? For loving? For killing? It’s these inter-textual thematic elements that make Quantum of Solace a worthy addition to the Bond series not just for its spectacular pace and action but for its attention to the psychological portrait of the still-womanizing Bond, here perhaps more than in previous outings, an enigma in Craig’s hands. Still, it’s that curious combination of the vengeful Bond and the motifs of righteous vigilantism that make this Bond especially resonant.
In that, it’s the equation between global destablization and terrorism that finally makes Quantum perhaps a force to be reckoned with in future Bond films if the series moves in that direction with the next film. An ironic twist on Goldfinger, holding Bond to account for every woman he seduced and subsequently dies for him, is a definite highlight and brings Quantum of Solace renewed resonance in the world of oil-driven economies. Ultimately though, it’s also the environmental theme which perhaps makes this Bond of especial relevance, with the concurrent release of the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still also alluding to human misuse of the environment in its themes. Concluding unfinished business, wrapping up loose ends and with the establishment of a new Global enemy for Bond to face down next time: Quantum of Solace is Bond in top-notch form.
