Review: ‘Quantum Of Solace’ On DVD

Here’s the thing, if you’re a Bond fan you will already love this film as one of the best Bond flicks out there. However, even if you don’t like the James Bond flicks of the past, this will pump your adrenaline as a fantastic action flick. Just like 2006’s Casino Royale, there’s nary a gadget in site and the silly one-liners have been left at home. There’s another break in the tradition of this film series in that Quantum of Solace continues directly from the end of it’s predecessor, but you needn’t have seen the other film to be able to ride this roller coaster. This time out, James Bond (Daniel Craig) is looking to bring down the persons responsible for backing the bad guy in the previous film. Once again he goes against the best interests of his superiors and must survive on his own. Luckily, his has returning allies Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright) and René Mathis (Giancarlo Giannini) watching his back. Sadly, one of those won’t be returning in any future installments. But don’t think this is an all-boys outing as the tough-as-nails M (Judi Dench), Strawberry Fields (Gemma Arterton) and Camille (Olga Kurylenko) are more than capable of helping Bond on his mission/vendetta as well as putting him in his place when need be. Again, sadly, one of those will not be able to make a further appearance.

The thing I like about Craig’s Bond is that he is a flawed person, carrying around a couple of suitcases worth of mental and emotional baggage. He’s also very ruthless; once he decides someone is his target the end result is nothing less than another dead body and Bond moving on to the next part of the mission. Until Daniel Craig took over the role, James Bond was played as a charming playboy, casually bedding a woman one moment and shooting up the bad guys the next all with a wry smirk. With Craig’s performance, however, the charm and dashing personality are merely a mask, only useful in completing the mission and easily discarded. In this film he only really ever let’s his true self out in a pivotal scene with Camille, when it appears that they both might die. Camille is just as flawed as Bond and as self-destructively reckless as he is. She is essentially a female version of Bond, just without the discipline of MI6 training or the protective eye of M. I would like to see Camille become a recurring character in the franchise, much like Felix Leiter.

This DVD will look and sound great in your home theater, so if you missed it initially you’ll get much of the same thrill as those that saw it first in the cineplex. The special features are pretty nice for this set, but there is no commentary. As the locations for each Bond flick are an essential ingredient to the film, there is a lot of time spent here on the location shooting, both in the twenty-four minute “Bond on Location” and in another “On Location” featurette. The second one is part of a larger series of “making of” vignettes. A lot of information is repeated between the two location features, so you could easily skip the second one. “Start of Shooting”, “On Location”, “Olga Kurylenko and the Boat Chase”, “Director Marc Forster”, and “The Music” provide a lot of detail as to what went into making this epic film. You really get a sense of the scale that goes into a Bond production as well as the director’s thought process and his approach. There are also a whole bunch of crew “video blogs” that were shot and posted on the film’s official site while it was in production. I watched these as they were originally posted, but it’s great to have them all in one place. You’ll meet most of the crew who participated in making this film and it furthers one’s appreciation of the scope of the production. Other than that, there’s the usual teaser and theatrical trailer and the music video by Jack White and Alicia Keys of the movie’s theme song, “Another Way To Die”.

So, yeah, Bond fans have already pre-ordered this, but I think fans of action films or even just well-made films will thoroughly enjoy themselves. This is one you should make a permanent collection of your DVD library.