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How would you direct Quantum of Solace? What would you change?


187 replies to this topic

#181 Zorin Industries

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Posted 04 March 2010 - 08:52 PM

11) You would not see the wood for the DVD boxsets and expect every new Bond film to be nothing but a retread of what went before and when it dares to not do that as those who make them want to move things on a bit the fans get all upset.

12) By the way, everything you state has been done countless times in countless Bond films.

13) Peter Morgan's notion of "shocking" could be just that to some fans. I.e. SOLACE was not a glitch.

#182 ChristopherZ22

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Posted 04 March 2010 - 09:18 PM

11) You would not see the wood for the DVD boxsets and expect every new Bond film to be nothing but a retread of what went before and when it dares to not do that as those who make them want to move things on a bit the fans get all upset.

12) By the way, everything you state has been done countless times in countless Bond films.

13) Peter Morgan's notion of "shocking" could be just that to some fans. I.e. SOLACE was not a glitch.


Ah, Zorin Industries! I forgot about you. You are the one that argues that bland means fun and interesting. I agree with you about On Her Majesty's Secret Service being Fleming's best novel, and there are a few things in A View To A Kill that I like despite it being tired and bland most of the time. Unlike you, however, I cannot make myself enjoy Bond films for being bland and dull. Blandness just doesn't attract me, and it isn't something I want Bond films to be. But if the producers can be robbed of ideas, feel uninterested in the material, are increasingly feeling burnt out to the point where their films lack personalities, and basically make a colorless film like Quantum of Solace, than I am sure you will be enjoying some future Bond films.

#183 byline

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Posted 05 March 2010 - 01:28 AM

But if the producers can be robbed of ideas, feel uninterested in the material, are increasingly feeling burnt out to the point where their films lack personalities, and basically make a colorless film like Quantum of Solace, than I am sure you will be enjoying some future Bond films.

In your opinion. Nothing in what you state above is provable fact. While that may be how you feel about, I've heard/read nothing to indicate that the producers felt "uninterested in the material," etc., etc., etc.

#184 Zorin Industries

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Posted 05 March 2010 - 10:56 AM

11) You would not see the wood for the DVD boxsets and expect every new Bond film to be nothing but a retread of what went before and when it dares to not do that as those who make them want to move things on a bit the fans get all upset.

12) By the way, everything you state has been done countless times in countless Bond films.

13) Peter Morgan's notion of "shocking" could be just that to some fans. I.e. SOLACE was not a glitch.


Ah, Zorin Industries! I forgot about you. You are the one that argues that bland means fun and interesting. I agree with you about On Her Majesty's Secret Service being Fleming's best novel, and there are a few things in A View To A Kill that I like despite it being tired and bland most of the time. Unlike you, however, I cannot make myself enjoy Bond films for being bland and dull. Blandness just doesn't attract me, and it isn't something I want Bond films to be. But if the producers can be robbed of ideas, feel uninterested in the material, are increasingly feeling burnt out to the point where their films lack personalities, and basically make a colorless film like Quantum of Solace, than I am sure you will be enjoying some future Bond films.


Glad you forgot about me. I'm a bit prickly about who remembers me...

Christopher, WHEN did I ever state here or elsewhere that I enjoy "Bond films for being bland and dull". When it comes to most things in life I do not "make myself" do anything.

My fondness for A VIEW TO A KILL is based on a whole range of reasons. And none of them have anything to do with what some people's reaction to the film was or is. I don't "like" or "hate" Bond films as my spectatorship and experience of them works on slightly wider perspectives than "it was great" / "it was bad".

And you clearly don't know the "producers" in the same light others do if you think they are "uninterested" in the material. Talk to them and you will discover otherwise. And where is the "evidence" that they are "burnt out"? Work with them and you will discover otherwise. "Burnt out" producers do not circle the potential likes of Mendes and Morgan for their next project.

#185 SecretAgentFan

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Posted 05 March 2010 - 11:32 AM

Well, such a thing would certainly have chimed somewhat with Fleming's Bond. (In DR. NO, Honey asks 007 whether he's ever slept with a call girl, and he replies that it's not something he's done in a long time.)

I agree, though, that: "It seems as if Strawberry Fields was included in the script solely to serve as a sperm receptacle for Bond, because no Bond film dare show Bond not getting "his rocks off" at least once. It was gutsy and bold for Bond to have a leading lady he didn't sleep with, but somewhat of a cop-out that EON felt the need to go ahead and include at least one disposable broad anyway." Fields' use a spunkbucket for 007 does rather undercut the whole "point" of his not sleeping with Camille.

But then, I'm one of only a handful of Bond fans for whom QUANTUM OF SOLACE is actually overlong, as opposed to a film that's woefully short. I think it would have worked much better at 90 minutes or so, with much less action (the boring boat chase and silly dogfight/freefall being dropped). At an hour and a half, QUANTUM could truly have been the lean, mean bullet of a film its supporters claim it to be (since when is 106 minutes a lean running time?).

But, just as Bond MUST be seen getting his rocks off, a Bond film MUST have "audience-pleasing" action sequences that don't serve the story.


I have to say that, after some water now went under the bridge, I actually share this sentiment, too. QOS might indeed profit from cutting the airplane part, Fields character and some of the motorboat chase. The framework of the plot doesn't really call for them, doesn't need neither the second girl for the 'sacrifice death' (that's already covered with Mathis) nor the after all unconvincing air battle (especially as it's not clear what Bond hoped to find out by flying over a patch of landscape that didn't offer any chance for him landing the plane).


You make interesting points.

I guess Fields was indeed only a plot device. Yet one that could not have been excised. Bond needed a contact at that location. To make this character an attractive woman Bond could seduce (and also have some verbal fun with) surely alludes to the traditional function of the "Bond girl". But if it only had been a minor male operative, you couldn´t have made that character much fun. Also, I guarantee it would have provoked an outcry: Oh, no, Bond does not sleep with any woman in this film - ooh, why couldn´t they have made that male operative a woman!

Apart from that, I feel that Bond flirting with Fields shows him in the process of "getting over" Vesper. But just as he feels that he gains the upper hand, Mathis is killed. And then, the second punch in the face: the innocent Fields is killed as well, just because of her association with Bond.

Cutting the motorboat chase... I don´t see how they could have done that. It´s important to show that Bond is tracking Camille and trying to save her - although she does not want to be saved. And since Camille would have been killed by Medrano if Bond had not intervened, the chase was necessary IMO.

The plane attack - well, that really was not necessary plotwise. Bond could have searched the area in order to find out what the source of the water problem was. But again I have the feeling that audiences would have criticized that sequence because... hey, it´s a Bond film and nothing happens? Why couldn´t they have put a chase in there?

Granted, one can feel EON struggling to meet expectations of the mass audience. But they have risked so much with CR, it is only understandable that they didn´t want to estrange the audience too much.

And the massive box office of QOS - a fact some members just don´t want to realize here - is a clear sign that the film (including the filmmakers´ decisions) was received very well.

#186 Lachesis

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Posted 05 March 2010 - 12:41 PM

Granted, one can feel EON struggling to meet expectations of the mass audience. But they have risked so much with CR, it is only understandable that they didn´t want to estrange the audience too much.

And the massive box office of QOS - a fact some members just don´t want to realize here - is a clear sign that the film (including the filmmakers´ decisions) was received very well.


DaD was a considerable box office improvement over TWINE or TND and was considered one of the more successful Bonds at the time so there is a bit more to it than that. The Box Office that most influenced EON really appears to be BOURNE in that it consistently outperformed BOND. So were EON really taking a risk with CR or was the unification of Flemings solid novel and a Bourne makeover a realitvely safe move. Then what happens when Fleming is cut away, something that cannot be avoided?

The most significant grumble I have with with QOS is the loss of his individuality, the downplaying of key elements, the simplification of what was escapist adventure to what appears to be basic self motivated action. Are such films well recieved, clearly they are, should Bond adapt, probably, but we then face the potential line at which the character ceases to be recognisable (a personal descision everyone must face) commerce and temporal trend overwhelming what for some has been 50+year romance. Yes I am a grumpy old man but beware one day it comes to us all ^^.

#187 Royal Dalton

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Posted 05 March 2010 - 12:58 PM

I guess Fields was indeed only a plot device. Yet one that could not have been excised. Bond needed a contact at that location. To make this character an attractive woman Bond could seduce (and also have some verbal fun with) surely alludes to the traditional function of the "Bond girl". But if it only had been a minor male operative, you couldn´t have made that character much fun. Also, I guarantee it would have provoked an outcry: Oh, no, Bond does not sleep with any woman in this film - ooh, why couldn´t they have made that male operative a woman!

Apart from that, I feel that Bond flirting with Fields shows him in the process of "getting over" Vesper. But just as he feels that he gains the upper hand, Mathis is killed. And then, the second punch in the face: the innocent Fields is killed as well, just because of her association with Bond.

Alternative scenario:

Mathis doesn't travel with Bond (which would have been good for his health). Instead, he arranges for Bond to meet up with a foxy South American agent, who Bond seduces in five seconds, goes to the party with and later turns up dead in the back of his car.

#188 Zorin Industries

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Posted 05 March 2010 - 01:27 PM

I guess Fields was indeed only a plot device. Yet one that could not have been excised. Bond needed a contact at that location. To make this character an attractive woman Bond could seduce (and also have some verbal fun with) surely alludes to the traditional function of the "Bond girl". But if it only had been a minor male operative, you couldn´t have made that character much fun. Also, I guarantee it would have provoked an outcry: Oh, no, Bond does not sleep with any woman in this film - ooh, why couldn´t they have made that male operative a woman!

Apart from that, I feel that Bond flirting with Fields shows him in the process of "getting over" Vesper. But just as he feels that he gains the upper hand, Mathis is killed. And then, the second punch in the face: the innocent Fields is killed as well, just because of her association with Bond.

Alternative scenario:

Mathis doesn't travel with Bond (which would have been good for his health). Instead, he arranges for Bond to meet up with a foxy South American agent, who Bond seduces in five seconds, goes to the party with and later turns up dead in the back of his car.

Yes, that is a good progression. Which is why it has already been used in most other Bond films.