NO TIME TO DIE Countdown: QUANTUM OF SOLACE Revisited

In the No Time To Die Countdown, Jake Tropila takes a look back at every Bond film – official and unofficial – in anticipation of the release of the latest entry.

This one I struggle with more than any other.

Casino Royale raised the bar impressively high for the franchise. A rock ’em, sock ’em spy adventure, a faithful adaptation, a perfectly realized action film — call it what you will, it was a smashing success in every regard, transcending everything Bond is and would be to deliver the greatest entry this series has ever seen. Any follow-up was destined to pale in comparison, regardless of actual quality.

Up to this point, a “direct sequel” had never been attempted in the world of Bond. There have certainly been some loose instances of connective tissue between previous films — From Russia With Love remarks on Dr. No’s death, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service makes a brief reference to a “’64 gold job”, the various allusions to Tracy, etc. — but the Bond timeline has always been rather nebulous, which each film existing on its own terms and capable of being enjoyed in a vacuum.

Quantum of Solace changed that forever. Picking up literally moments where Casino Royale left off, the twenty-second official Bond film charges ahead like a bat out of hell, breaking new ground in the process. If Craig’s first film introduced the brand new 00 agent to the world while simultaneously robbing him of the one woman he loved, his sophomore effort turned him into the literal Angel of Death, leaving destruction in his wake and murdering everything in sight. Ideally, this could have been Craig’s Licence to Kill: a brutal, searing symphony of vengeance. That’s a Bond film I can get behind.

If only it were better. Quantum of Solace arguably remains the most divisive Bond film in the pack, with a slight lean towards the negative. Passionate cases have been made for the film’s greatness; frankly, I just don’t see it. While my most recent watch (the one I did specifically for this column) has been the most positive thus far, there are still a few troubling aspects of the film that I cannot shake. We’ll cover it all. It’s 2008. Hop into my oh wait we’re already going what oh man this is exciting, okay punch it let’s goooooo.

Earth, Water, Wind and Fire

Dropping Bond into a mission completely devoid of context is not a new phenomenon. Here, 007’s Aston Martin is being tailed by a small fleet of Alfa Romeo’s, who all want him dead for some reason or another. Seems like business as usual. It’s only when Mr. White is revealed to be in the trunk of Bond’s car does the slight cognitive dissonance take over and the realization sink in: Casino Royale’s ending took place just a few short moments ago. That is, if you even remember Mr. White, a minor shadowy figure from the previous film.

But I’m getting ahead of myself; let’s talk about that car chase. Frenetic, fast, and furious, Quantum’s opening makes a case for the series’ best car chase. Editing becomes a bit overheated (more on that in a bit), but the tactility of everything is something to behold. These cars are literally torn to shreds: doors are ripped off, fenders are dented, and windows are smashed in. Blink and you could potentially miss everything, it all moves so quick. Bond coolly remarking to Mr. White that’s time to get out of the trunk is also a real winner. For all its issues, the Quantum of Solace certainly opens demanding your attention.

Can’t say I’m too fond of the title song, though. For the first-ever duet, Jack White and Alicia Keys come together for a rock ballad that leans heavily on the electric guitar. The pair sing the balls off the song, but I actually find it abrades the senses rather than soothes them. A rare miss, at least in my eyes (or would that be ears?). At least we have David Arnold reporting for duty, for the fifth and final time. John Barry might be the Bond composer gold standard, but Arnold frequently excelled in his own tenure. Second place is not so bad, sometimes.

Mr. White’s interrogation follows. He’s a member of QUANTUM, a clandestine, SPECTRE-esque organization that literally has people everywhere, and has even infiltrated MI6, which exposes Mitchell, M’s personal bodyguard. Gunfire breaks out and Bond gives chase yet again.

While action has always factored into every Bond film, turning Bond himself into a straight-action hero is a fundamentally misguided idea (so much so that Roger Ebert was even vehemently opposed to this idea in his contemporaneous review). Bond films are about class, charm, and character – action is secondary, and almost never the allure. Part of the blame lies squarely on the shoulders of the Bourne franchise: in all of Bond’s “emulate what’s popular” ethos, this is one of the worst offenders, as quick cuts and shaky-cam were very much in vogue in the mid-to-late-aughts.

That’s not to say that Bond can’t do good action: just look back as recent as Casino Royale’s parkour chase, and tell me how many 21st-century action films can beat that. But therein lies the rub: Quantum of Solace learned all the wrong lessons from Casino Royale. In the first half-hour alone, there’s an extended car chase, an extended foot chase, and an extended boat chase (an extended plane chase also occurs, but it’s much later into the film). Everything wants to outdo the parkour chase, and yet none of them hold a candle to that sequence.

Part of the problem is Marc Forster, an untested action director, as the choice to helm the film. The other part of the problem is the Writers Guild of America strike that befell production. So much of Quantum feels horribly rushed, that it often feels like it’s barely hanging together. The action is shot and edited into oblivion, and the story suffers from being wafer-thin. Running time-wise, this is the shortest Bond film in the series, and it goes by so fast that it feels inconsequential as a result.

Forster has gone on the record stating that he wanted his four main action set-pieces to represent the four elements: earth (opening car chase through the quarry), water (boat chase), air, (plane chase), and fire (the final showdown in the hotel). To which I say, big deal? That’s all fine if you added some basic thematic elements to your action, but they ultimately do not add up to much here.

Property of a Lady

A lot happens in quick succession. Bond visits a hitman in Haiti, murders him, and then assumes the identity of a said hitman to meet Camille (Olga Kurylenko), our Bond Girl. Camille’s story is already in progress: her parents were murdered by a Bolivian General, and she sleeps with Dominic Greene, an operative with QUANTUM, to get close to the General so she can murder him. Camille’s mission should be one of fire – like For Your Eyes Only’s Melina Havelock, she has her own motive, but the character never has a chance to come alive. She and Bond never even consummate their love for each other, something that rarely happens.

So, Dominic Greene. Mathieu Amalric is a fine actor, and he utilizes his naturally creepy-looking eyes suitably well. But Greene is nothing more than a sniveling pest, a real dud of a Bond Villain populated by real duds of everything else. For instance, what’s his plan all in service of? Water. Just water. The particulars remain vague to me, but the ultimate endgame in Quantum of Solace is that Greene is diminishing the water supply in Bolivia so that he and General Medrano can rise to a global power for the sake of…profit, I guess? Again, it’s never made abundantly clear.

If I’m being too hard on Quantum of Solace, let me share one sequence I genuinely love: Tosca. Bond surreptitiously infiltrates the Opera, which happens to coincide with a QUANTUM meeting, as they discuss the fate of Bolivia out in the open using hidden earpieces (it’s not made evident to us yet that they’re talking about water, not oil, with terms like “the world’s most precious resource” being thrown around). Bond secures his own earpiece, and, as Bond is wont to, boldly announces his presence, interrupting the meeting and causing the QUANTUM agents to flee.

It’s a terrific sequence, and the impressionistic gunfight that occurs immediately afterward also feels like the moment that Quantum of Solace might finally be coalescing into something remarkable. Sadly, these good feelings do not last forever. For a film that feels like its comprised solely of berserk action sequences, only does the one at Tosca elevate above something beyond mediocre.

All of these words have gone by and I’ve yet to really mention Craig. He maintains his position as one of the stronger Bond’s, but his abilities are never really stretched beyond how far he can run, how high he can jump, and how hard he can punch. His relationship with M, one of the highlights in Casino Royale, is also quite tenuous here. Bond has a habit of traveling to a location to follow up on a lead, murdering the lead, and M getting pissed at him. Rinse and repeat.

The introduction of Gemma Arterton as MI6 agent Fields (her first name is listed as “Strawberry” everywhere else but the film) has the potential to spark some life in the film. Sadly, she’s wasted as a minor love interest for Bond, before being turned into a sacrificial lamb for the mission. I don’t mind a callback to previous entries every now and then, but dousing her in oil on a bed to look like the corpse of Jill Masterson feels particularly shameful.

The rest of the supporting characters never take off either. David Harbour is broad and insufferable as CIA agent Jim Beam. Elvis, Greene’s henchman, is pathetically weak. General Medrano, our secondary villain, is a grotesque caricature and a belligerent asshole. Even Jeffrey Wright, returning as Felix Leiter, spends a large portion of the film looking annoyed, like he wishes he were elsewhere. His lone scene with Bond in the bar actually crackles and offers a rare glimpse as to what the film could have been.

Everything comes to a head at the aforementioned Fire Hotel, which offers us the hilarious sight of seeing diminutive Greene yelping like a banshee and going after Bond with a fire axe. The building burns and Greene is left to die in the desert, but not before seemingly filling Bond in on everything there is to know about QUANTUM (we’re not made privy to any of this information, unfortunately). The denouement with Vesper’s ex-lover similarly underwhelms, partly because the bulk of the confrontation take place off screen. Vesper’s plotline resolved? I don’t think so.

Conclusion: Quantum of Solace

I struggle with Quantum of Solace not because it’s bad, but because it’s a huge disappointment. I’ve read all the passionate pleas. I’ve seen the detailed arguments. I just don’t get it. There’s plenty to like here, but the film remains massively flawed and strangely empty, all likely the result of a hampered production. Daniel Craig remains dutiful as ever, but following the franchise zenith that is Casino Royale, this should have been a lot better.

Coming up next: Bond takes some time to think about what he’s done in a very self-reflexive entry. The No Time To Die Countdown will return with Skyfall.

What do you think? Is Quantum of Solace secretly one of the better films in the series? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Watch Quantum of Solace