‘Quantum of Solace’ Review (Blu-Ray)

When Ian Fleming’s James Bond was scheduled for a reboot, with an entirely new back-story starring Daniel Craig, all I could think was, “James Bond isn’t blond!”

The stereotyped blond hair look screamed Kelly Bundy from Married with Children. Bond would be inevitably become less intriguing and devolve into more boy toy slick-spy filled with Hollywood glitz. When Casino Royale finally hit the theaters, I sat back and realized how wrong I was.

Daniel Craig was everything I could imagine Bond to be that wasn’t Sean Connery. The story had a different twist on some old Bond traditions, but that didn’t hurt the film one bit. Instead, Bond became accessible to a new generation of viewers. More importantly, Craig set the tone for a darker Bond to venture into the cinema.

When Quantum of Solace was released, the 22nd installment in the Bond franchise, my heart was broken. Everything I had come to love about Daniel Craig as James Bond was stolen from the story. The story actually sounds like it should be very entertaining and filled with emotional intrigue. Bond is heart broken after the woman he loved betrayed him and is filled with revenge. His thirst for blood leads him to encounter the villain of Quantum of Solace, Dominic Green. Greene is an environmentalist using his wealth and power to help overthrow a government in exchange for a barren piece of desert land that will allow him to control the country’s water supply.

Unfortunately, instead of focusing on the actual story, the film focuses on being one long action sequence right after another. It doesn’t take a breather until at least thirty or forty minutes have elapsed from the film. By that time, you’re wondering what exactly it was that you were watching. The actual scenes where Bond is allowed to speak and interact with his boss and confidant M, the villain of the story Dominic Green and his inadvertent partner Camille are quite good. And, if you were able to stick it out through the barrage of rush-rush scenes you’ll find a very good story buried inside.

Had director Marc Foster chosen to focus on Bond’s character instead of creating one non-stop thrill ride from beginning to end, we may have wound up with another Casino Royale. Unfortunately, the thrill ride is distinctly without thrills since there is no build up throughout the story. Instead there is a build-down and the final action sequence ends up feeling like a thrill-less dud.

Relaunching Bond is one thing, but taking away the human interactions he has as he out thinks the villain, swashes around witty banter, and inevitably gets the girl is recipe for disaster. Luckily, there is about forty minutes of slow down between heart-race montages that will remind you of why Daniel Craig deserves his place in the annals of Bond-hood.

Bonus Features:
- “Another Way to Die” Music Video
- Bond on Location featurette with Quantum of Solace producers and Daniel Craig. Journey into Latin America as director Marc Foster’s discusses his desire to use authentic locations, extras and set dressing to bring character depth to Quantum of Solace.
- Start of Shooting featurette: I was actually upset to see that a couple of the Daniel Craig interviews were repeated between the Start of Shooting featurette and the Bond on Location featurette.
- On Location featurette: This is almost a double up of the Bond on Location featurette. For some reason they broke this up into two featurettes to make it look like more, but it is just an expanded view of the locations featured in Quantum of Solace. Some of the character interviews are also repeated from Bond on Location.
- Olga Kurylenko and the Boat Chase featurette: A quick look at the new Bond girl and her training regiment for Quantum of Solace.
- Director Marc Foster featurette
- The Music featurette
- Crew Files Behind-the-Scenes Clips: See video blogs from key crew positions for Quantum of Solace, including: Location Manager, Second Assistant Director, and Director of Photography
- Theatrical and Teaser Trailers