AJB live commentary on QUANTUM OF SOLACE

HigginsHiggins GermanyPosts: 16,618MI6 Agent
edited June 2020 in Off Topic Chat
Time for another group-viewing, this time, it‘s

QUARANTINE OF SOLACE




90fa45e341.jpg


London Summertime: 20:00
Paris Summertime: 21:00
New York local time 15:00
LA local time 12:00



PLEASE KEEP IN MIND THAT WE ARE ALL STARTING 10 MINUTES LATER !

The 19:00 deadline is set so that everybody has enough time to find their DVDs/Blu Rays, boot their players and get done with the menus and pause right where usually the gunbarrel would begin.

WE ARE STARTING PRECISELY AT 19:10


- Please make sure that everybody has their BluRay/DVD/VCR ready and start the player latest 19:00 GMT to get done with all the dodgy menus.
- PAUSE YOUR PLAYER RIGHT WHERE IN THE NAME OF ALL THAT IS JAMES BOND THE GUNBARREL REALLY SHOULD BE
- HIT PLAY PRECISELY AT 19:10.

I‘ll post some timecodes during the thread just in case that somebody has messed it up
President of the 'Misty Eyes Club'.

Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
«13456713

Comments

  • Golrush007Golrush007 South AfricaPosts: 3,418Quartermasters
    Higgins wrote:

    PAUSE YOUR PLAYER RIGHT WHERE IN THE NAME OF ALL THAT IS JAMES BOND THE GUNBARREL REALLY SHOULD BE
    - HIT PLAY PRECISELY AT 19:10.

    Quite right! The gunbarrel should absolutely, definitely be there!!
  • HigginsHiggins GermanyPosts: 16,618MI6 Agent
    Hope that Barbel is getting his bagpipes ready :D
    President of the 'Misty Eyes Club'.

    Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    Just my guitar, I'm afraid.
  • Thunderbird 2Thunderbird 2 East of Cardiff, Wales.Posts: 2,774MI6 Agent
    Ohhh, this one is going to be hard work....

    Still, there is something in QoS that will present some one off fun....
    Must remember to have paracetamol handy too....
    This is Thunderbird 2, how can I be of assistance?
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    (a) Weak villain
    Someone once said "a Bond film is judged by its villain" and there's truth in that. Dominic is one of the, if not the, least imposing and interesting villains ever.




    (b) Weak villain plot
    I mean, Eon guys, water? You ran out of Fleming ideas like gold, diamonds, Fabergé eggs, and settled on water?

    How about something like

    Bond: You sent for me, M?
    M: Ah, sit down, 007. Tell me, have you heard of Dominic Cummi.... er, I mean, Dominic Greene?
    Bond: The total wan... er, I mean, international platinum tycoon? But of course.
    M: It's our belief that he's been smuggling his platinum around the world, perhaps concealed in his fleet of unusually silver-toned private jets. He and his mistress, Sacrificia Cleavage, will be boarding one tonight and I think you should- etc etc

    Too easy? Too obvious? Well it beats water!



    (c) Weak song
    In fact, weak is a compliment. It would be happy to crawl out of "absysmal" and reach the rank of "weak".
    "Weak" is something along the lines of "Writing's On The Wall". This doesn't even reach "forgettable", like "Dirty Love" (most will have forgotten that one) or "pales in comparison" like Sheryl Crow's TND did to kd lang's "Surrender" and this thing does to just about everything.
    In over 50 years of listening to Bond songs (yeah, ok, I know) I've genuinely never been so disappointed with one. Including DAD. Including NSNA.
  • MikeG77MikeG77 Posts: 1,770MI6 Agent
    Gymkata wrote:
    Barbel wrote:
    Sacrificia Cleavage

    Just so you know, I'm totally using this name for my next character in the MMO that I'm playing.

    That's an excellent screen name :))
    I know where you keep your gun!
  • HigginsHiggins GermanyPosts: 16,618MI6 Agent
    I‘ve recently watched QoS and while everything and more on Barbel‘s list is true, it‘s a movie that is easy on the eye once that you are not bothered by the chopped editing style.

    I mean, we all have seen the movie now and we know what happens and what should happen. So we can sit back and simply enjoy the view.

    Barbel can use some earmuffs when the titles are played and good thing is, that it‘s much shorter, so soon it‘s over :D

    It‘s certainly not on the bottom of the barrel on my list

    As for smuggling Platinum on private planes - not such a good idea.
    Pt is f*cking heavy and only half as expensive as gold.
    President of the 'Misty Eyes Club'.

    Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    I wasn't expecting to be taken seriously!

    Gymkata, please feel free.
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    MikeG77 wrote:
    Gymkata wrote:
    Barbel wrote:
    Sacrificia Cleavage

    Just so you know, I'm totally using this name for my next character in the MMO that I'm playing.

    That's an excellent screen name :))

    Thank you. Partially it's from the Shakespeare thread. https://www.ajb007.co.uk/topic/47380/ajb-presents-william-shakespeares-james-bond-in/
  • HigginsHiggins GermanyPosts: 16,618MI6 Agent
    What I‘ll never forgive Marc Forster are the crappy type fonts to explain the locales...

    I mean, you are making a totally polished hipster style movie and are using type fonts right out of a Spaghetti Western?
    President of the 'Misty Eyes Club'.

    Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
  • Shady TreeShady Tree London, UKPosts: 2,965MI6 Agent
    edited June 2020
    This is going to be interesting.

    I like Greene as a villain. He's sleazy and arrogant and the sort of villain one might have found in a Fleming short story. I think that, like LeChiffre, he's not really meant to be the 'Mr Big' figure.

    Quantum's Bolivian plan fits with the more 'realistic' take adopted for Craig's tenure at this point: it feels like it could have been one in a number of concurrent operations by a global, SPECTRE-style criminal organisation.

    I've moved from hating the song, when the film first came out, to accepting what it's trying to do by way of 'deconstructing' Bond. To me, it splinters from the aesthetic of Lulu's 'The Man With The Golden Gun' and somehow ends up suiting Marc Forster's approach. Admittedly, I prefer listening to the song while watching the official music video (Alicia Keys gifs, anyone?) but, @Barbel, to compare 'Dirty Love' favourably with this is a real blow to the solar plexus!

    I'm sure we're on safer ground if we can agree that Arnold does a great job by bringing his own themes to the score which link QOS to CR as its sequel and by providing some cool new 'spy'/Bondian cues. And given the radical (for Bond) editing style of the film's action scenes, Arnold had a job on his hands to score the action: he pulls it off admirably.

    For me, the key questions are:

    is Forster being too iconoclastic with Bond film conventions, making 'a Marc Forster film' to an extent which risks disappointing Bond audiences? (The editing style comes into that question, but the question relates to other elements, too.)

    how far did the strike by The Writers' Guild of America compromise the film in its finished form? Given that Forster was aiming for a more challenging style of story-telling anyway, the way the strike hit the production may compound some of the film's arguably confusing or less effective plot turns and screenplay moments.
    Critics and material I don't need. I haven't changed my act in 53 years.
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    Re Arnold- very much agree.

    Re the editing- I do understand what the intention was. IMHO they fail in that intention. The prime exhibit for that statement is the scene of Mitchell's sudden turn and Mr White's escape. A first-time viewer which we all were initially comes away with the definite impression that M has been shot.
    Shots are fired, we see M fall out of the picture. During the choppy action a hazy out-of-focus figure runs through a door. On subsequent viewings the action can be pieced together, but why should that be necessary? If we're supposed to be in doubt about whether M has been hurt or is even dead, we see her completely unharmed a few minutes later. Pointless, and unclear storytelling.

    The fonts weren't a problem, the film has bigger issues to concern us.

    This was the first (and to date only) Bond film that I walked out of the cinema disappointed in. Over the years it has grown on me, and I can see it has good points- but for me those are outnumbered by the bad.

    I think Eon saw this, too. With their next Bond film, they found another way to try.
  • Shady TreeShady Tree London, UKPosts: 2,965MI6 Agent
    I think that's a very true analysis of the effect of the editing. It takes repeated viewings to piece it together - fine for home viewing - but what about the crucial first experience of the film in the cinema, and evidence that people felt disappointed? (- anecdotal evidence, at least; and plenty of it. I remember feeling that way, too.)
    Barbel wrote:
    I think Eon saw this, too. With their next Bond film, they found another way to try.

    {[] {[] {[]
    Critics and material I don't need. I haven't changed my act in 53 years.
  • Golrush007Golrush007 South AfricaPosts: 3,418Quartermasters
    Barbel wrote:
    This was the first (and to date only) Bond film that I walked out of the cinema disappointed in.

    I felt quite strange walking out of the cinema - it was as if I was in denial, thinking to myself it can't be disappointing, it's the sequel to Casino Royale - it had to be good!
  • Shady TreeShady Tree London, UKPosts: 2,965MI6 Agent
    Barbel wrote:
    Bond: You sent for me, M?
    M: Ah, sit down, 007. Tell me, have you heard of Dominic Cummi.... er, I mean, Dominic Greene?
    Bond: The total wan... er, I mean, international platinum tycoon? But of course.

    Guy Haines, as special advisor to the British PM, has the same role as Cummings.

    As Bond might have asked, "Where do you think you're going?"

    As Mr White might have added, "Lockdown isn't for everyone."
    Critics and material I don't need. I haven't changed my act in 53 years.
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    :)) :)) :))

    ...and now I have to figure a way to work that into the Adventures of Sir James!
  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,702MI6 Agent
    I think QoS has a number of problems. The documentary-style fiming and editing that worked so well in the Jason Bourne movies is misplaced in QoS, but it's also badly done. Instead of creating a sense of reality and urgency it's just confusing. I don't think the villan himelf is a real problem, but his henchman is. Elvis is probably the worst henchman ever. That being said I sometimes toy with the idea of an alternate reality where Almaric plays le Chiffre and Mads Mikkelsen plays Dominic Green. Mikkelsen was fantastic in CR, but one of the tallest and fittest actors ever to play a Bond villan is playing a villan that requires creepiness and no fighting ability. That sounds more like Almaric to me. Green on the other hand does fight with Bond. Unlike Almaric Mikkelsen would have no problems looking like a physical threath to Bond.
    The struggle to control water is a real and serious threath, but it has little urgency to it. When the stakes are Bolivian farmers having to move to the slums of La Paz in a couple of years because of lack of water there is no sence of a ticking clock. This theme would be more at home in a Le Carre novel.
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    I like the idea of Mikkelsen playing Dominic, cos he's brilliant in everything, but wouldn't want to meddle with the near-perfect* casting in CR06 for fear of spoiling a fine movie.

    * I did say NEAR.
  • HigginsHiggins GermanyPosts: 16,618MI6 Agent
    And you did not mean Eva Green 8-) :D
    President of the 'Misty Eyes Club'.

    Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    Eva :x :x :x
  • Shady TreeShady Tree London, UKPosts: 2,965MI6 Agent
    edited June 2020
    Gymkata wrote:
    One of the biggest issues with QOS is that it's entirely reliant on knowledge of CR in order for Bond's character arc to work.

    I wonder whether the film-makers had half an eye on the home entertainment context of the 00s. A significant section of QOS's original cinema audience would have seen CR again, at home, on dvd, at some point since CR's own cinematic debut. After QOS, in turn, became available on dvd, viewers at home would be free to see the two movies back to back and explore the connectedness. (It was different in the 60s and 70s. Individual choice about which Bond films to see when - at what intervals, and in what order - didn't come along until the emergence and growth of home video, in the 80s/90s.)

    Marc Forster may have wanted to be artsy. The producers and writers may have taken some inspiration from the trend for serialised long-form narrative, developing in American cable TV. But if the Bond film-makers were getting caught up in the idea of arcs, sequels and challenging story-telling, they were perhaps losing focus on the importance of the original cinematic experience for the notional casual viewer - and they were also somewhat scuppered by the Writers' Guild strike. I think you're right. Probably the majority of QOS's movie-going audience would have felt frustrated that the film doesn't conform with what was the general expectation of any Bond film being accessibly stand-alone.
    Critics and material I don't need. I haven't changed my act in 53 years.
  • Sir MilesSir Miles The Wrong Side Of The WardrobePosts: 26,417Chief of Staff
    Barbel wrote:
    Re the editing- I do understand what the intention was. IMHO they fail in that intention. The prime exhibit for that statement is the scene of Mitchell's sudden turn and Mr White's escape. A first-time viewer which we all were initially comes away with the definite impression that M has been shot.

    I NEVER got the impression that M had been shot - and was surprised when people on here thought that she had been (on initial viewing)…and I like the editing, giving the impression of a frantic chase in which you don’t always know exactly what is happening, or will happen…and I love the theme too - so most of you are blind and tone deaf :v :)) :007)

    QoS ranks as my second or third favourite film in the franchise so far -{
    YNWA 97
  • Shady TreeShady Tree London, UKPosts: 2,965MI6 Agent
    edited June 2020
    I definitely thought M had been shot. Although the opening car chase, most of the Bond/Mitchell conflict and the DC3 scene are intelligible (just), the gunfight at the opera is just wasted by the artsy editing - thrown away - imho, and the boat chase could have been more enjoyable if not so radically snipped up.
    Critics and material I don't need. I haven't changed my act in 53 years.
  • emtiememtiem SurreyPosts: 5,686MI6 Agent
    Yeah I’ve always been curious to know what the Aston chase at the beginning was scripted as. There’s so much obviously gone missing (doesn’t one of the baddie cars even disappear?) and the ending is so abrupt and unsatisfying I find it hard to believe that’s what was planned.
  • emtiememtiem SurreyPosts: 5,686MI6 Agent
    edited June 2020
    Number24 wrote:
    I think QoS has a number of problems. The documentary-style fiming and editing that worked so well in the Jason Bourne movies is misplaced in QoS, but it's also badly done. Instead of creating a sense of reality and urgency it's just confusing.

    Yeah, I really like that editing style in the Bournes: it makes it exciting and gives you just enough to follow the action. But it’s just done not as well here, and occasionally it makes things hard to follow.

    And they seem to have decided to cut it right to the bone. Does the script open straight into the car chase? Maybe it does, but I just don’t think it works. You can open in media res, but not literally in the middle of an action scene.
    Number24 wrote:
    I don't think the villan himelf is a real problem, but his henchman is. Elvis is probably the worst henchman ever.

    I saw on Twitter the other day that when you see him on the phone he’s saying “yes mommy, it’s awful hot here” in his language. No joke!
    There are attempts to subvert the normal in this, but quite a lot of them are subversions which hurt the film.
    Number24 wrote:
    That being said I sometimes toy with the idea of an alternate reality where Almaric plays le Chiffre and Mads Mikkelsen plays Dominic Green. Mikkelsen was fantastic in CR, but one of the tallest and fittest actors ever to play a Bond villan is playing a villan that requires creepiness and no fighting ability. That sounds more like Almaric to me. Green on the other hand does fight with Bond. Unlike Almaric Mikkelsen would have no problems looking like a physical threath to Bond.

    I like Almaric in this: his weird eyes and snarling works well I think. And they just about make the fight work too because he’s got an axe and he goes absolutely crazy in a way Bond can’t predict.
  • emtiememtiem SurreyPosts: 5,686MI6 Agent
    Gymkata wrote:
    If memory serves, a stunt driver was killed making the PTS. That may have had an effect on some of the action.

    I don’t think that’s right, no. They crashed a car into the lake but no one died.
    Gymkata wrote:
    I don't believe one of the bad guy cars disappears outright without any explanation. I'll watch for it tomorrow.

    Yeah I’m not certain about that: I think I read someone saying it recently.
    I’ve always had the feeling that there was an idea that Bond would tip his car in order to make his gun flip into his hand. It feels like there’s something clever missing in that sequence.
  • BarbelBarbel ScotlandPosts: 36,053Chief of Staff
    Sir Miles wrote:
    Barbel wrote:
    Re the editing- I do understand what the intention was. IMHO they fail in that intention. The prime exhibit for that statement is the scene of Mitchell's sudden turn and Mr White's escape. A first-time viewer which we all were initially comes away with the definite impression that M has been shot.

    I NEVER got the impression that M had been shot - and was surprised when people on here thought that she had been (on initial viewing)

    Is it possible (and I'm being serious) that you blinked at that exact moment, when M falls to the right? Or looked down at your popcorn?
  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,702MI6 Agent
    So it's Quarantine of Solace tomorrow? :D
  • Charmed & DangerousCharmed & Dangerous Posts: 7,358MI6 Agent
    :)) :)) :))
    "How was your lamb?" "Skewered. One sympathises."
  • CoolHandBondCoolHandBond Mactan IslandPosts: 6,030MI6 Agent
    For me, QOS is a mess, especially the lunacy of the editing. The story is bland and it is the only Bond movie I have seen in that upon leaving the cinema I felt absolutely flat. After CR I had such high hopes and it was so disappointing to watch. Does anyone know why Martin Campbell didn’t direct what was essentially a direct sequel?

    I used to rank the movies but it kept changing slightly every time I saw one, so I now categorise them as A, B, C or D.

    QOS sits firmly in D along with GE, TWINE and DAD.
    Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
Sign In or Register to comment.