I actually wrote most of this review some time ago, and completely forgot about it for a while. This week I have 6000 words to write in order that I don't fail my new year's resolution at the final hurdle, so in that spirit I thought I'd review all the things that I haven't yet had a chance to. Those of you with an RSS feed for this blog, I'm sorry for my length absence and sudden revival. Also, thank you. Now, to the review...
Bond films are generally renowned for their action content and the character of Bond himself. The peripherals such as plot and other characters tend to somewhat incidental, and merely tools to drive everything else forward.
Casino Royale, Daniel Craig's first Bond appearance, seemed to buck this trend, with an intelligent and honourable, if duplicitous Bond-girl, a dramatic as well as action-packed plot and a hard-edged Bond that leant away from the suave near-parody that previous Bonds had become.
Quantum of Solace, however, veers away from coherency in favour of flashy action and special effects. The plot, if present, is difficult to grasp and tenuous at best. At the end, every strand of plot I thought I had gathered slipped away again, and I was left with the sense that I had just spent two hours watching people running through odd scenes and having exciting car chases.
I enjoyed this film as an action flick. There were some fun, if stereotyped scenes of Bond running through burning buildings, across rooftops and swinging from ropes. There was lots of shooting and drama. The Bond girls were pretty, and feisty. They also followed the modern trend of Bond girls that weren't just kidnap fodder and eye candy.
The unfortunate and disappointing thing about this film was that, although all the elements of a great Bond film appeared to be there, they didn't quite fit together right. There seemed to be a plot until the end when I realised that nothing had properly been explained. The 'trust issues' that M feels towards Bond get old after a few re-hashings. And then the pretty action sequences just serve to further drive home that nothing makes sense.
After Casino Royale, this was a bit of a backwards step, but I still enjoyed it for its mindless entertainment value. If you generally enjoy Bond films, and chewing-gum-for-the-mind in general, then you'll enjoy this film as well, but I wouldn't go into it with your expectations set too high.
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