2008 Woodie Awards
Quantum of Solace just a bit of comfort for Bond
Issue date: 11/20/08
It isn't surprising that James Bond is in a rush. He's angry. His ostensibly faithful girlfriend Vesper Lynd drowns in teary martyrdom.
She leaves a card with information on "Mr. White" - the first of countless names in the malevolent "Quantum," an organization which doesn't quite enter into the light as we might expect. This may not bother some; again, this movie moves fast - there's no time to stand because Bond craves revenge, and we open in a blink to an Astin Martin careening along a hillside with villains in standard pursuit. This movie is not playing around.
The bullets hiss and sink, and the camera shifts to Daniel Craig's calm, chipped face, then back to the cars, the scene, the cars, back to Bond, henchmen pirouette screaming into water, and before we know it, 007 parks. The car might be torched but Craig is ready for what's next. He has the same dark resiliency that made this film's predecessor, Casino Royale, so effective. But one wonders as Bond smirks his opening line and the title sequence sends him walking breastcontoured Dunes to Jack White and Alicia Keyes: Does Quantum keep in step with the reboot, or is it old business as usual?
There's no denying the series' biggest facelift. Blonde-boy Daniel Craig upset some fans when he was first announced as the graying Pierce Brosnan's replacement, but he has come to fit the role well. Craig can flex the suave machismo in most situations - at dinner, at the card-table, with some anonymous thug plunging a knife shallowly into his back. In Quantum of Solace, there's the additional dimension: vengeance. Bond is displeased.
His lack of reluctance to dispatch anyone rather than leave them breathing goes double-time here. You'd be hard-pressed to argue he isn't mad. But is it grief, really? It's difficult to tell. He'll charge through some building knocking people off of railings, and then M (Judy Dench) will call to lecture him.
She'll tell him he's going too far. It's something he likes, and facially, Craig is the most expressive Bond yet; he fully understands his preference for destruction and what it means, but it was easy to forget the revenge element of his character when it wasn't directly addressed. Bond is Bond. He didn't seem to need a dead lover to spark him before. Still, it's part of the plot, and it's depth we never saw in the darkest Dalton days of the franchise.
She leaves a card with information on "Mr. White" - the first of countless names in the malevolent "Quantum," an organization which doesn't quite enter into the light as we might expect. This may not bother some; again, this movie moves fast - there's no time to stand because Bond craves revenge, and we open in a blink to an Astin Martin careening along a hillside with villains in standard pursuit. This movie is not playing around.
The bullets hiss and sink, and the camera shifts to Daniel Craig's calm, chipped face, then back to the cars, the scene, the cars, back to Bond, henchmen pirouette screaming into water, and before we know it, 007 parks. The car might be torched but Craig is ready for what's next. He has the same dark resiliency that made this film's predecessor, Casino Royale, so effective. But one wonders as Bond smirks his opening line and the title sequence sends him walking breastcontoured Dunes to Jack White and Alicia Keyes: Does Quantum keep in step with the reboot, or is it old business as usual?
There's no denying the series' biggest facelift. Blonde-boy Daniel Craig upset some fans when he was first announced as the graying Pierce Brosnan's replacement, but he has come to fit the role well. Craig can flex the suave machismo in most situations - at dinner, at the card-table, with some anonymous thug plunging a knife shallowly into his back. In Quantum of Solace, there's the additional dimension: vengeance. Bond is displeased.
His lack of reluctance to dispatch anyone rather than leave them breathing goes double-time here. You'd be hard-pressed to argue he isn't mad. But is it grief, really? It's difficult to tell. He'll charge through some building knocking people off of railings, and then M (Judy Dench) will call to lecture him.
She'll tell him he's going too far. It's something he likes, and facially, Craig is the most expressive Bond yet; he fully understands his preference for destruction and what it means, but it was easy to forget the revenge element of his character when it wasn't directly addressed. Bond is Bond. He didn't seem to need a dead lover to spark him before. Still, it's part of the plot, and it's depth we never saw in the darkest Dalton days of the franchise.
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