CR was a great Bond action film with a good storyline that got us familiar with Craig and gave us the Bond "Year One" introduction in a refreshing new way. QoS was interesting because it is a true sequel in that it begins right at the end of CR. So what the hell happened?I'd have to argue that the change in director created the downfall of the film's quality. Director Martin Campbell did a great job on CR, so unless he was crazy on set, why change directors? I read in some article that Craig decided he wants Marc Forster so the producers hired him. BIG mistake. I am able to separate parts of films so that I can appreciate what they were trying to do. For instance, if an action flick is a terrible movie because the characters and/or storyline was bad, I can give them kudos for any great action sequences. However, QoS failed on all counts. The opening car chase was OK, but I never felt a thrilling sensation while watching it, thinking, aw this is cool! My enthusiasm of looking forward to QoS started to dampen as I thought to myself, "Uh oh. I hope this is just one bad sequence. Surely the movie will get better." Note: I repeated this mantra constantly until it passed the halfway point and I realized there is no coming back from this mess of a movie. What else was wrong? Hmm, let me count the ways...
The characters and their action really didn't make sense. The feminine element, "Camille," is being pursued and nearly killed by her lover, and she KNOWS this, yet walks right into a warehouse hidden from public view to confront him with no weapons at her disposal. Later, the "thrilling" sequence of Bond in a rickety wood boat goes up against a harbor filled with the bad guys men who have superior speedboats and Bond escapes by destroying the boats but having no other militia coming after him, even though the bad guy pretty much has the harbor under control. Yeah.
The storyline becomes more convoluted with its desperation to throw every unnecessary action sequence at you and characters who have no motivation other than you know they are the "bad guys" so they must do bad things. And then who creates a villain's supersecret lair powered by flammable hydrogen gas? Did they not learn anything from the Hindenburg? Geez, maybe this movie was meant to go down in flames. As a franchise, QoS did make me think Craig's Bond series is on a downward spiral. I can only hope they have learned from this sophomore mistake and will improve with the junior endeavor of BOND 23. I may hate, but I always have high hopes.
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