Good, relentless action film. But still a leap back compared to Casino Royale...

Rating: 6/10 (31 October 2008)

In a nutshell: I, for one, found Bond's latest "Quantum of Solace" quite enjoyable but with some annoying flaws. Almost non-stop action with some sarcastic bits of humor (but never to the point of making the hero look silly or ridicule himself, like a Roger Moore 007, or Downey's Iron Man more recently) and all-around good acting. On the other hand the script is weak and quite messy, uselessly convoluted for the paper-thin story it tells.
Direction-wise this is *not* a cheap Bourne rip-off as some people have claimed here and there. It truly feels like a Bond movie. The action is frenetic, filmed pretty much in the same vein as "Casino Royale", which is a good thing. Sure, there are some bold tracking shots and not-so-steady cam, but never to the point of being too shaky. It's used efficiently, not in a show-off way. A Bond movie has to be spectacular and if clearly not groundbreaking that one hits the mark.
But as far as I'm concerned, the rest wasn't as tight. The direction is somewhat repetitive (especially when establishing one of the countless new locations, when the director abuses of music and multiple cuts to amp up the exposition scenes, as if the action scenes weren't titillating enough). The story is poorly introduced and it gets worse with every new character hitting the screen. As for the usually excellent Mathieu Amalric playing the main baddie, he's given too few too late to really shine. His very last scene with Daniel Craig is really good, the fights are brutal and the guy clearly has the charisma to stand against Bond, but plot-wise he's really wasted.
Now, for the lame mistakes they cleverly avoided: no Michael Bay editing style. No - or at least very few - obnoxious product placement. No annoying or miscast Bond Girl. The movie is not shying away from the violence, with possibly one of the highest body-counts in the whole franchise. This is still the assassin Bond we're given (with another great performance from Daniel Craig), not the caricatured spy. The opening title sequence is being designed by newcomers in the Bond universe and they made a very good job, blending all the ingredients without being too flashy and that actually benefits the song from Jack White and Alicia Keys. I found said song much more enjoyable during the credits than without them - where "Casino Royale" gave me the exact opposite feeling.
Unfortunately, almost everything else was handled more firmly by Martin Campbell and the producers in 2006. Marc Forster does a decent job and took some interesting decisions regarding the tone as well as some specific scenes (without spoiling much, I'd say that his use of Puccini's "Tosca" was quite original) but sometimes too much action is detrimental, even to an action movie.
All in all, a good but flawed Bond movie whose downsides could have been easily avoided. Following "Casino Royale" was doubly harmful; not only because of its inherent quality, but also for the writers' mishandling of its legacy. If the next Bond tries again to tie some loose ends from "Quantum of Solace", I just hope they'll learn from their mistakes and give it a more coherent feel. No one wants to suffer the decreasing quality of the post-GoldenEye Bonds again, right?