A competent show weighed down by a complicated and clumsy production
Achieving longevity as a franchise is a complete chimera if you don’t at least try to read a little about the times in which you operate. That James Bond, a character presented on movie screens more than 60 years ago, has maintained its waves of relevance in mainstream cinema is quite a discovery that has been built through renewals of tone and actor. Daniel Craig presented a different line with a saga that tried to consolidate itself in ‘Quantum of Solace’.
Who controls the water
His second film as 007 was directed by the Swiss Marc Forster (the first non-British director to make a film in the saga), and it was the one that tried to establish emotional and narrative continuity for the character, something that was not a priority until then. Today you can watch on television through La 1 starting at 10:50 p.m. this blockbuster that had a complicated production.
Trying to overcome his traumatic past with his former love, 007 receives a new mission from British intelligence that will make him deal with a complex organization. A powerful and ruthless businessman will try to take control of the most valuable resource on the entire planet: Water. Bond will go on the hunt to prevent him from carrying out his plan, which involves destabilizing world governments, with unlikely help to do so.
Organizing the entire secret and criminal plot around water was intended to be a reference to ‘Chinatown’. A wink that is the closest ‘Quantum of Solace’ is to being refined entertainment, since ends up suffering due to the inexperience of his director in the action section and a filming that was completely disrupted when it began without a finished script.
The film went into production in the midst of a writers’ strike, back in 2007, and the task of finishing the script and tweaking it that would fall to one writer ended up being carried out by Forster and Craig. Something the actor deeply regrettedseeing clearly that it did not solve the situation, and ended up swearing to himself not to do anything similar as long as he could.
And it’s true, ‘Quantum of Solace’ is a film of plot and mysteries that are incomprehensible or, at least, confusing to follow, with action sequences that are competent at best. The film was supposed to be a paradigm shift following the story and tone of the magnificent ‘Casino Royale’, but fell halfway in almost all areas. Fortunately, it didn’t take long to recover.
In Espinof:
