Riveting Craig, Great Action Make Up for Uneven Plotting & Characterization

Rating: 7/10 (27 January 2009)

In his second James Bond film, QUANTUM OF SOLACE (QoS), the riveting Daniel Craig again proves he's the most ruthless 007 since Sean Connery, blasting the Bond formula with a breath of fresh air -- that is, when he and the cast can catch their breath between great rock'em-sock'em action scenes that wouldn't be out of place in the BOURNE movies (no surprise, since some of the BOURNE personnel were on board)! Although director Marc Forster effectively films all of QoS's running, jumping, and doing, I would have liked the movie even more if the plotting and characterization had gotten as much screen time as the frenzied action sequences, like the excellent CASINO ROYALE. (I know I'm dating myself here, but it's still hard for me to invoke the title "CASINO ROYALE" without thinking of the 1967 comedy version. :-) But I digress...) I do hope the next Bond film has a better balance of action, plot, characterization and emotion, otherwise we might as well be watching a video game. I liked the stern yet warm-beneath-the-surface, almost mother-son relationship that Craig's Bond and Dame Judi Dench's M are developing (Bond wryly acknowledges this in a throwaway line). I also liked Olga Kurylenko as Bond's revenge-minded main love interest, Camille; she's one of the few good-guy Bond girls who can take care of herself instead of "Oh, James!"-ing all over the place. I wish they'd made better use of the winsome Gemma Arterton, though; she deserved to do more than just invoke GOLDFINGER. Heck, with all the running around the characters did on screen, I didn't even realize Ms. Fields' first name was Strawberry until I saw it in the closing credits! I wish they'd done more with Arterton's character, but at least she got endearingly naked with Bond. Giancarlo Giannini and Jeffrey Wright return and are most welcome, although Wright still doesn't get as much to do in the role of Felix Leiter as he should. Ah, well, now that Bond has avenged his beloved Vesper's death and gotten the dying-of-thirst Dominic Greene (reminiscent of his MUNICH character) to drink oil, maybe the next Bond film can concentrate on new plots and scenarios with a better balance of all the elements that make 007 fun to watch, and they'll let Daniel Craig crack a smile -- or at least a cool, knowing smirk -- more often. :-)