Bond Needs to Lighten Up

Rating: 6/10 (27 November 2008)

Let's get it out of the way and answer the question everyone wants to know the answer to: Daniel Craig's sophomore outing as James Bond is not as good as "Casino Royale."
I've never been a James Bond fan, and "Casino Royale" was really the first one I've ever liked. So I'm not comparing "Quantum of Solace" or Daniel Craig to any of the other Bonds. On its own terms, "Solace" just isn't that much fun. It's certainly fast, and it has plenty of rapid cut action sequences that films like this seem to require. But it also has a brutal, dogged quality to it, and there isn't anything here that you haven't seen done a hundred times (notably in the recent Bourne movies, which have more intriguing story lines to along with their well-orchestrated action sequences) and done better.
Craig is still refreshingly scrappy when compared to Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan, but he's also turned Bond into a rather boring character, more terminator than international man of mystery.
Grade: B