Well done but not outstanding

Rating: 7/10 (7 November 2008)

Now that I finally happened to see it, I have my difficulties to state a clear opinion. Okay, let's start, I did not expect QOS to better and outdo CR, for me it was clear from the outset, that this would be an almost impossible task, as CR IMHO is an outstanding Bond movie (in my personal list it tossed off GF after 20 years to take top spot, but that's just my personal opinion). First of all, the movie does not feel too short, it feels more like a two-hours-movie. But the problem is, that too much happens action wise within the short time, I sometimes felt I would like a short slowed down scene as some sort of a breather, just to relax a bit. This movie keeps one on the edge of one's seat for the full running time, which on the one hand is a good thing, but as I said, sometimes you just would like to shout "Could you please slow down for a few minutes?." Then the other problem is, there is a lot of action going on, but the story does not catch up with that. Actually the story as such is not bad, we had worse in Bond movies, but, well, a bit more of character development and personal relations (a strength of CR) would have been nice. There is less there than meets the eye, once the movie is over, you think "hey, the story was not actually THAT great." As somebody observed, with CR they had a rich material from where to develop their plot, this feels more like a Michael G. Wilson script for the mid-80's Bond. Next time maybe a bit less of breathtaking action (which was shot and directed in great style, no doubt) and a bit more of a story (without the clumsy romantic bits of CR), whoever writes the screenplay for that.
Director: Marc Forster does a nice job, taken that he usually does not do action movies. Roberto Schaefer delivers beautiful and stylish pictures, the direction is well-handled, with the sole exception that it is a little too fast-paced.
Screenplay: Well, maybe it shows, that Haggis was under heavy time pressure to finalize his draft before the WGA strike kicked off, and maybe the constant rewrites did not help the matter much (I have the same problem with TND, which too me simply is incoherent and falls apart in too many bits and pieces). After his much lauded efforts on CR, Haggis has to take part of the blame for that, too.
Actors: Daniel Craig delivers in the expected great manner, taken that he is not given as much "meat" as with CR, but he continues his interpretation of Bond and makes the character his own. And I like the deadpan way h delivers his one-liners, quick and dry. Mathieu Amalric was fine and creepy, but as with Jonathan Pryce and Robert Carlyle (both very fine actors), he was not given enough room to develop his character, Mads Mikkelsen got a much better written part in CR. Giancarlo Giannini and Jeffrey Wright are excellent when they are on screen, but they have both not enough screen time to show their excellence, but they make the most out of it. Olga Kurylenko was alright, a good job, but not outstanding. Gemma Arterton had very little screen time, and her character remained completely shallow throughout, she really was there to have at least one short sex scene and then suffer a spectacular death (great bow towards GF, that was). Judi Dench is as always reliable, but her M becomes too dominant for my taste. The rest of the cast did well. Little question to the native English speakers: Did Anatole Taubman also deliver his lines with a Swiss German accent in English? In German it's not only an accent, the few sentences he does not utter in French, are in broad Swiss German dialect. Or was that just a silly idea of the dubbing director?
A highlight was the Tosca scene, IMHO the best scene of the movie. The parallel shootout with the opera scene and with almost inaudible gunshots and the Tosca music instead reminded me a little of THE GODAFTHER Part 1. Another great scene was Mathis' death, this was played brilliantly by both Craig and Giannini, moving, touching, sad, and one of the few quiet moments. The final scene with Vesper's boyfriend on the other hand is again too rushed, it's like "Oh, we have to resolve that bit as well." Greene being left in the desert with just a can of oil was a nice idea, very cynical and very efficient...
Music: On CD the score sounds better than in the film, and as omnipresent as the Bond theme is on CD, you don't get that much of it in the film. But as I said, Arnold's score IMHO is his third best Bond score (out of 5)...
All in all I will watch the movie again once or twice and maybe it will grow a bit more to me by repeated watching, but after the first viewing I would say: It was alright, it was very entertaining and worth to watch, but not a Bond classic. After the outstanding CR it was expectable that they would not outdo this, it's good, but it could have been better. And we should be glad they pushed back the release date for six months, otherwise we would have got an even more rushed up movie. Maybe 3 years to develop and shoot and edit the movie is better, but then I hate waiting for 3 years, 2 years is almost too long. But if we get a better movie with Bond 23, maybe 12 months more would help the movie. A mixed bag, and I would give it 7 out of 10.