Quantum of Solace (2008)

Today, the James Bond marathon brings us to the very first direct sequel of a Bond film: Quantum of Solace (2008), the 22nd film in the official series.

SYNOPSIS:
James Bond (Daniel Craig) and M (Judi Dench) question the mysterious Mr. White (Jesper Christensen), who informs them that the secret organization he belongs to has people everywhere.  Proving his point, M's personal bodyguard turns on the agents in the room, causing a commotion that allows Mr. White to escape.  Determined to find out more about this mysterious organization that blackmailed Vesper and got her killed, James Bond pursues a trail that leads him to Dominic Greene (Mathieu Amalric), an environmental philanthropist who's also a high-level operative in a secret and highly-influential organization called Quantum.  Through Greene and Quantum, Bond gets closer to learning about the secret organization that's infiltrating governments and threatening to control the world.

REVIEW:
There will be light spoilers in this review.  I will mark them so you can skip over them if you want.

This film picks up shortly after Casino Royale (2006) ended.  Bond is being pursued in his Aston Martin DBS by several cars, with their passengers shooting at him.  Managing to evade them, he pulls in to a secret location in Siena, Italy and pops his trunk to reveal Mr. White, held captive.  M and some other MI6 personnel are waiting to interrogate him, but he taunts them with the fact that they didn't even know his organization exists.  As explained in the synopsis, he escapes thanks to an embedded agent of his organization, and disappears.

Mr. White, being interrogated by M and James Bond

This film is not only the first direct sequel of a Bond film, continuing the story from the first film, but also the first Bond film to not start out with the famous gun barrel scene.  Instead, it's been moved to the very end of the film.  I think they did that for better flow of the story.  Interrupting a gritty, dark storyline for a random gun barrel scene seems kind of out of place.

James Bond is chastised by M for killing everyone he comes across.  They want to question people so they can gather more intel about Quantum, but Bond keeps killing anyone who puts up a fight.  M herself gets reprimanded for having a loose cannon for an agent and is told to bring him in, or else the Americans will put him down.  She cancels all his passports and credit cards, forcing him to meet René Mathis (Giancarlo Giannini) for a hook-up.  Mathis has been cleared of all accusations from the previous film and was given a nice property to retire on as an apology.

Mathis explaining to his girl why she shouldn't give Bond fine wine

When Bond refuses to come in, M sends Strawberry Fields (Gemma Arterton) to retrieve Bond and bring him home, by force if necessary, but Bond continues his determined path toward Quantum.  Eventually, M is forced to come herself and attempt to take him in, but Bond escapes MI6 control, determined to discover Quantum's plan and put a stop to it.

The appropriately-named Strawberry Fields

Something interesting about this film is that the line between good guys and bad guys is blurred.  M and James Bond both see this secret organization as a threat to their very existence as a secret  intelligence service.  But governments look more at the "big picture."  They're told that Dominic Greene is buying supplies for oil pipelines and will provide them with a fraction of whatever he finds.  He's even working with the CIA who want a cut of his oil finds.  The British Foreign Secretary (Tim Pigott-Smith) tells M, "Say you're right... Say Greene is a villain.  If we refused to do business with villains, we'd have almost no one to trade with."  Between the Russians and Americans claiming every bit of oil they can find, England is willing to do deals with shady people if it'll give them valuable resources.  So Bond pursuing him is putting the government at risk.

Regardless of how frustrated she is with Bond, M continues to support his decision, deciding that she trusts his judgment more than anyone else.  With potential moles throughout her organization, she needs to have faith in someone, and the one person going against the grain and fighting to uncover this mysterious organization in opposition to MI6 is the one person she can trust.

As I mentioned previously, the Americans are hunting James Bond because he's a liability.  They're trying to do a deal for oil with Dominic Greene, and Bond is interfering.  Specifically, we see two CIA agents working with Greene - Gregg Beam (David Harbour), and Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright).  Bond meets with his buddy Felix to request information on Greene, but their exchange is short, as the CIA is sending in a team to take out Bond.  They're pissed because Bond offered to let them take in Le Chiffre in Casino Royale (2006), but he ended up dead.  Now Bond is leaving a trail of bodies everywhere, and he's after Greene.  Leiter, not convinced that Greene will benefit America's goals, helps point Bond in Greene's direction before the CIA shows up to take Bond down.

Felix Leiter and James Bond, sharing intel over a couple beers

Also along for the ride is a woman named Camille Montes (Olga Kurylenko), who is determined to kill General Medrano (Joaquín Cosío), who Greene's organization, Quantum, is establishing as the next president of Bolivia.  The General murdered her family when she was a child, so she wants revenge.  Her existence in this film is almost pointless, except to give Bond someone to work alongside in the field.  Their separate goals bring them to the same end, and Bond is able to guide the young lady toward satisfying her revenge.  Maybe he understands her plight, what with his ultimate goal being revenge as well.

Camille Montes, meeting General Medrano for the first time since childhood

SPOILERS AHEAD: Skip the next two paragraphs if you want to avoid them.

The thing is, Dominic Greene is fooling everyone.  The plot of land he's acquiring in Bolivia has no oil.  Instead, he's building underground dams to dry up the aquifers, creating a water shortage.  His organization, Quantum, has deposed the previous president of Bolivia and they're putting General Medrano in place as the new president, only asking for this chunk of "useless" land in exchange.  Once the General is appointed, Greene informs him that his organization now owns 60% of all water in Bolivia and the General will sign a contract making them the exclusive water utilities supplier for the nation, or else they'll depose him too and find a new guy to take his place.  Of course, Bond shows up and eventually captures Greene.  He interrogates him, then dumps him in the middle of the desert with only a can of oil.  He bets Greene that he'll walk 20 miles before considering drinking it.

Using the intel he got from Greene, Bond tracks down Vesper's boyfriend in Russia.  In Casino Royale (2006), M explains to Bond that her boyfriend was kidnapped and she was blackmailed into doing what the secret organization requested, or else they'd kill him.  But Bond learned that the boyfriend was actually a member of the organization himself, manipulating the emotions of intelligence members to gather intel.  When Bond finds him, he's dating a Canadian intelligence officer.  Bond informs her that her boyfriend will "go missing" and she'll be blackmailed to give up state secrets to save him. He also points out the Algerian love knot necklace she's wearing, saying he gave it to Vesper too, and she's now dead.  He lets the girl leave and she thanks him.  Despite having found the man responsible for Vesper's betrayal and eventual death, Bond shows a surprising amount of restraint.  He doesn't kill him; instead handing him over to MI6 to deal with.  When M asks if he'll come back to MI6, he tells her he never left.

END OF SPOILERS.

Again, Q doesn't make an appearance, and Bond doesn't get any fancy gadgets.  His Aston Martin DBS V12 is beaten up by the end of the chase scene at the beginning of the film.  And he still carries his Walther P99 handgun.

The title of this film, Quantum of Solace (2008), is the name of a short story from Ian Fleming's 8th James Bond novel, "For Your Eyes Only."  The short story's name is the only thing pulled from the novel; the story itself is told to Bond by a man at a dinner party, about a failed marriage and how, when the "quantum of solace" drops to zero, humanity and consideration of one human for another is gone and the relationship is finished.

Interestingly, the epilogue of this film is similar to another short story in a James Bond novel.  "Octopussy and The Living Daylights," the 14th and final Ian Fleming novel, had a short story titled, "007 in New York," where Bond travels to America to warn an MI6 agent that her boyfriend is actually a KGB agent.

This film is the last one (so far) to pull its title or story from a previous James Bond novel.  Of all the novels Ian Fleming released (two posthumously), there are only four short story titles that have not been used as movie titles yet. They are Risico, The Hildebrand Rarity, The Property of a Lady, and 007 in New York. Although the last one's plot was similar to this film's ending, and The Property of a Lady was the name of the Fabergé egg in Octopussy (1983).

Continuing the trend that the previous Bond film started, this film's main theme song also isn't named after the movie.  It's titled, "Another Way to Die." It was written and produced by Jack White and performed by him and Alicia Keys. The rest of the soundtrack for the film was written by David Arnold.  Honestly, I'm not a fan of this main theme song.  It's energetic and exciting, but just feels... off for a James Bond film.  You can listen to it here:

RECOMMENDATION:
Despite doing well in the box office, this film got a lot of criticism.  Watched in sequence with Casino Royale (2006), it makes sense.  But on its own, it just feels odd.  There are a lot of references to the previous film that you may not remember or understand if you didn't watch them together.  Overall, Casino Royale (2006) was a brilliant film that used great storytelling to keep you engaged, with action as needed to drive the plot.  Quantum of Solace (2008), on the other hand, feels like it tried to go back to the old action flicks.  Lots of explosions and shaky camera scenes, and scattered exposition all over the place.  I've seen it maybe 3 or 4 times now, and watching it in conjunction with the previous film, I think I finally understand the whole plot.  I'd recommend watching it as an extended storyline to Casino Royale (2006), not as a stand-alone film.