Ain't It Cool News (www.aintitcool.com)
Movie News
Mastidon's Spoiler Heavy QUANTUM OF SOLACE Review!!
Merrick here...
Readers Talkback
Hi Guys, Mastidon here if a review I'm not sure you want to read. BEWARE! This review is not your friend. If you have not seen QUANTUM OF SOLACE yet, I recommend reading no further and going far, far away from this page. The review will be divided into 2 sections - basic plot type spoilers which follows the story of the film and spoilers that if you read them ahead of time significantly reduces your initial film enjoyment. ****PLOT SPOILERS*** As you have probably already read in my other review, QUANTUM OF SOLACE picks up 1 hour after the end of CASINO ROYALE. Initially, you have no indication of this. The film starts with Bond being chased by some unknown guys as they drive down a Mediterranean highway. Bond is in his Aston. What a beautiful car. Too bad they rip it to hell in the scene. A good friend of mine wrote an open letter to EON Productions to stop the violence in Bond Films. His reason, how can they abuse such beautiful cars? Let Bond kill as many bad guys as he likes but leave the Aston Martins alone. The camera work is everything you expect from the Bourne films - think of the look of any of the chase scenes and you know exactly how it was shot with very fast cuts. After Bond escapes by running the guys off the road to their death, he pulls over and opens the trunk to reveal a tied up Mr. White who is the guy he just grabbed at the end of Casino and seems to be the one behind it all. Bond gives a one liner and the opening credits role. This is the first time you realize that the film is a continuation straight from Casino and one of the major reasons I say that you must watch Casino again shortly before Quantum. The more I hear the theme song, the more I hate it. It just simply doesn't work. That said, the visuals of the credits are right up there with any previous film. They certainly are the best ones in a long time. Imagine a fluid sand sculptures that come alive and break apart complete with naked women culminating in the gun barrel being formed from sand and shooting a sand bullet. It was too cool. The next thing we see is Bond driving into a safe house. It reminded me of a cross between entering the Bat Cave and Maxwell Smart walking down his long hallway of doors. M is here and starts interrogating Mr. White. She threatens him with more pain if he doesn't comply. He laughs and explains they have people everywhere. Bang. Bond pursues in chase with a scene straight out of BORNE ULTIMATUM jumping from roof to roof. A few points in this scene I noticed CGI at work. A bit disappointing considering the opening in Casino had no detectable CGI. When Bond finally returns to the safe house, Mr. White is gone. From information gathered by tracing marked bills from Le Chiffre, Bond heads to Haiti. He kills his only lead in a hotel room. Once again another balls out fight action sequence, You know Bond is going to kill the guy but how much torture will he inflict in the process? Bond gets handed the dead guy's briefcase as he leaves the hotel. Once outside, Camille (Olga Kurylenko) drives up and tells him to get in the car. He complies. She asks him to show her the contents of the briefcase. He opens it to find empty papers, her photo, and a gun. This was a great switch up. I clearly thought the briefcase had some important documents or evidence for her. Bond says something to the effect of that he thinks he is supposed to kill her. She tries to grab the gun. It goes off hitting nobody. He jumps out of the car. She drives away. Bond needing a vehicle takes out a motorcyclist who was following them in great fashion. It certainly looked painful for the guy on the bike. Bond grabs the bike and follows her to a dockside wheelhouse. Camille enters and greets Dominic Greene (Mathieu Amalric). She asks him point blank if he tried to have her killed. Greene turns her over to the new dictator of Bolivia General Medrano (Joaquín Cosio) who raped and murdered Camille's family as a child. As the General leaves with Camille by the sea, Bond steals a boat, rescues her, and has a nice small boat chase. Nothing too big. The real story is on Greene. He is the big villain in this one. Greene is a villain who uses the cover of a high tech company working to stop global warming. Instead he is using it to exploit the natural resources of the planet. This clearly is a shift from other Bond villains. Greene is not over the top and certainly not menacing. As I said in my other review, he had no blood dripping from his eye or pointy metal teeth. On paper he seems like Al Gore or Steve Jobs. Maybe not a guy you agree with 100%, but certainly one you would like to get to know to see what he is all about. Think of it this way - what if Steve Jobs had a mind control device in every iPod? This to me gives Greene the title of scariest Bond villain to date. Bond follows Greene to Austria where he is attending an opera. He notices that Greene is given a special gift bag when he checks in. He gets himself the same bag which contains an ear peace and a microphone. He positions himself in a high point overlooking the stage. Once the opera starts, members of the organization start to hold a meeting via the headsets. Bond listens for a minute then interjects. Immediately organization members start standing to leave. Bond pulls out this great gadget called a Sony digital camera and starts taking their photos. As Bond chases one through the crowd, we see Mr. White also attending the opera, however he was smart enough not to get up and leave. Bond kills one of the henchmen from the organization. As a result, Bond is suspended. He turns to Mathis (Giancarlo Giannini) for help as he is the only one he can trust. We last saw Mathis getting taken away in CASINO ROYALE for interrogation. Once again another tie to Casino that should not be ignored as Mathis's loyalty was in doubt. There is some nice interchange between the two and Mathis's spouse. Mathis agrees to go with Bond to Bolivia by the only way possible, commercial. Since when does Bond fly commercial? When Virgin is paying the bill. This had to be the single most offensive scene in the film to me as it was a 2 minute Virgin ad. Even as going as far as describing the laying flat feature of Virgin First Class. Product placement gone too far. They are met in Bolivia by Agent Strawberry Fields (Gemma Arterton) who looks like she is only wearing a trench coat. You never know her first name until the closing credits. I didn't notice it until reading IMDB. It is a great nod to those other British icons, The Beatles. Too bad he never makes any strawberry or Beatles jokes. Strawberry is there to send Bond back on the first plane tomorrow. After some comic relief around hotel rooms (which was the only real comedy in the film), Bond ends up in bed with Strawberry by using one of the corniest but coolest lines possible, "Can you come over here? I can't find the stationary." I had to smile and certainly can't wait to use that line myself next time I find myself in a hotel room. They attend a party to honor the humanitarian work Greene has done to help the fight against Global Warming. Camille is also there out for revenge. Bond rescues her again from Greene. As they leave the party, they are pulled over by the Bolivian police. They open the back of the car to find a dead Mathis. The way Bond disposes of the body shows just how cold he is and how far he has come. I must say it did disturb me a bit. Bond returns to the hotel only to find M waiting to arrest him for killing Mathis and for the another dead body just found in his room. Bond goes rogue then escapes to try and bring down Greene at his secret desert hideout where he is holding a meeting with the General. Bond seems to go rogue a lot doesn't he? Do secret agents or VP candidates ever follow orders? Bond and Camille trade a car for a plane. There is a nice plane canyon chase scene. In the end, they parachute out in a way reminiscent of past films. They land in a sinkhole only to discover Greene's sinister plot is not to help stop global warming or to tap the mythical oil reserves of Bolivia, but to steal all of the underground fresh water and charge outrageous sums of money for it by introducing a water shortage. Once again, no plot to blow up the world and move to space but simply steal water for profit making Greene a villain based in reality. Bond and Camille take their final assault on the compound. In the end, she gives him a kiss goodbye. I believe she is the first Bond girl that doesn't actually have sex with Bond. ***MAJOR SPOILERS***** These points will ruin the film's enjoyment for you so read no further unless you really want to know or have already seen it. OK, you're still here. I hope you have seen it already. With the first interrogation scene, Mr. White says we have people everywhere, the inside guy then shoots M. Now, here is one thing that I simply did not get. When Bond comes back to the safe house, everyone is gone. I assume they rushed M out of there for her protection. But clearly she had no bulletproof clothing on. She was shot. So the next scene opens with Bond talking to a perfectly healthy M. I think they cut a scene or at least some dialogue from there. It is something I would like to see back in the DVD release if it exists as it is just too abrupt leaving the audience wondering what happened. Gemma, oh Gemma. WOW. I don't think they could have come up with a better tribute to past Bond films than this. Bond returns to the hotel room to find M in his hotel room with another dead body. It is the body of Strawberry Fields laid out on the bed completely naked covered in oil! And I don't mean hot sexy massage oil but black gold, Texas Tea oil. At the time I wondered if they really filmed that with her or just used a prop. Gemma confirmed on the Red Carpet that she spent 4 hours naked shooting the 30 second scene. How nice it would have been to be on set that day. Quantum of what? The name game. In just about the final scene of the film, we learn the name of the organization - Quantum. Bond takes solace from the dismantling of Quantum. That's my take on it. I welcome yours. And I truly believe it is a great title. It makes you think about the past two films and all of the events that just occurred. Quantum still exists. Bond did major damage to the identities of its members but Mr. White is free. Is Quantum a reboot of SPECTRE? Or is it an entirely new Legion of Doom and SPECTRE is still out there waiting for us to see in Bond 23? I wish I knew.... ***END SPOILERS**** It has now been just under a week since I have seen QUANTUM OF SOLACE. Merritcat was not allowed into the press screening since she is a photographer and it was only open to journalists. I have promised to take her to see it when it opens here in Germany tomorrow. And to be honest, I can't wait to see it again. It is well worth my money, every penny of it! Mastidon will return.
