Quantum of Solace

Daniel Craig returns as the best Bond of all time. Traditionalists will reject this notion but I disagree with Sean Connery as being the best. First off, he played a stationary Bond, one who was cool and still swooped the ladies up. But this Bond does that but jumps, runs, chases, and fights back with a vengeance. He is a mover and a shaker, the villians be dammed.

This was another thriller, with nothing to compete against this movie, it should make a decent buck. Pride and Glory is a solid competitor, but nothing like DeJaVu was that came out about the same time as Casino Royale did a couple of years ago. That was tremendous movie, totally original, a cinematic wonder.

Olga Kurylenko can not be considered a bond girl but her looks are stunning. Probably the top 1-3 Bond actresses in the entire series. She hit the screens big time last year in the action movie Hitman. Olga is just stunning.

This Bond movie takes us to London, Italy, Haiti, and Bolivia. The villians again are this sinister group of men probably bent on upsetting the status quo of the world. This time, it is Bolivia, to close up the water movement in this counry and charge the populous a fortune for this essential ingredient. Among other utility fees. This is a pretty large group of people in this organization, Bond takes as many pictures as he can at this grand opera. He interups the conversation to see which ones reveal themselves in this massive audience. They reveal themselves by getting up and walking away, Bond, is up in the rafters, he snaps some photos but there are so many and the length of time to take a picture of each one does not exist. But with this informaton, M, Bond, and M16 are making headway into this organization and to know that it exists.

This organization is fiction though, the real villians on this planet are the members of radical Islam. They are the true culprits and are not afraid of suicide for there fringe viewpoints and lunatic beliefs.

Jeffrey Wright returns as the noble CIA agent. But he is buttressed by an overweight CIA agent, his supevisor, who is sloppy in his work, is a little more apt to deal with unsavior characters, and seems to be pretty unsympathetic towards the planet inhabitants.

Judi Dench is outstanding as M. She knows Bond should not trust anyone but is concerned that his vengeance can be too bloody. That is why this is an exceptional Bond movie, it is not independent of the previous one. The ending of Casino Royale rolls into this one, something the Bourne movies have woven into the film lore with success. That is why I liked this one, it was not separate from Royale, they were connected. If one has not seen Royale, they will miss some of the subtleties of this movie and what is driving Bond's rage. That is the way it should me. I wish the Lethal Weapons were more like they this, they were a little, but not as much as I would have liked. A sequel should have some times to the previous one, if it does not, might as well change the title completly.

The action was relentless and the movie starts off with an intense car chase and displays Bond's car driving skills and use of an automatic weapon.

The table like computer which M16 uses in the middle of the movie is impressive. That is the way flip technology and touch screen adaptations are headed.

Bond never makes a move, well, not really, toward Olga. He probably would have if he did not have the previous girl on his mind. The girl from Casino Royale, the accountant who double crosses Bond but actually saves his life be making a deal with this silent group. Apparently this group took some years off or were just laying super low since Pierce Brosnans James Bond's never mentioned this group. The evildoers in those movies were of their own making and had their own interests.

Two main culprits in this Bond. A Bolivian general and a Russian who is followed by Bond from Haiti, to I believe Italy, and then to Bolivia. The ending of this movie takes place at a desert home in Bolivia which has offices and residential section. It is gorgeous and quite large. Too bad about half of it is destroyed.

Bond has a wonderful part in this movie in which he gets these guys off their boat. Wow, I will have to see that scene again. It occurs quickly. Bond is out gunned and out manned but, with the help of Olga, knocks this ridged hulled boat up in the air. Prior to this scene, he just knocks a guy off of his motorcycle rather rudely. But Bond is on a mission, he blames this group for taking the girl he loves. Almost out of control, perhaps why Bond never falls for a girl like this again in any other movie. That is a liability.

Bond saves the English taxpayer a considerable amount throughout the film. In almost every place he goes, he does not rent a car or charge the taxpayer for these costs. He steals cars it seems like all of the time, steals motorcycles, boats, and even trades gorgeous cars he does not own for an airplane that is ultimately destroyed. Ofcourse he did not ask to be attacked in midflight.

I am still unsure of what the title means. Olga was spectacular and she was a fighter, they do not have to make her look super hot, she just is. Bond drops this villian off in the middle of the desert with some oil to drink at the end of the movie, righteous.

The nasty faction in this movie hide behind an environmentalist theme. They dupe the media and host country, they have the capital and finances to cause coups and prop up puppet dictators they can control. Hugo Chavez is mentioned in this movie. This movie hints that the US is too hamstrung in the middle east to do anything about South America, not sure how true this is. We could eliminate Hugo Chavez but so far, his words are just that. But it would be nice for Chavez to disappear, either publically or privately.

This movie is allocated 4 stars out of five. **** Would be five, just some scenes and some music that are not there that eliminate this possibility. Nevertheless, the movie is a triumph and worth seeing again.