Quantum of Solace
Directed by Marc Forster. Written by Paul Haggis, Neal Purvis, and Robert Wade. With Daniel Craig, Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Amalric, Judi Dench, Jeffrey Wright, and Gemma Arterton. (PG-13)
Quantum of Solace, the latest installment in the indestructible James Bond franchise, is something I never thought a Bond film would be—too intelligent for its own good. Even the title has come under attack; some call it pretentious and overly intellectual, while others deride it as meaningless. (For the record, I think it's fine; sure, they could have called it A Tidbit of Comfort, but that lacks a certain something.)
No, the trouble with this one is that in their eagerness to update Bond for a new world—a process begun two years ago with the superior Casino Royale, which marked Daniel Craig's first turn in the famous tuxedo—the filmmakers have thrown the baby out with the bath water, stripping Bond of nearly all that made him stand out in an action-hero world. Gone is the gadgetry; gone is the faithful secretary Moneypenny; gone, too, is most of the humor that has made the series such a touchstone. It's hard to think that the Mike Myers of a future generation will find much to lampoon in this Bond.
Instead, Craig's Bond is a cold killer on the trail of those responsible for the death of the woman he loved. Tracking some marked currency that MI6 (the British spy agency) has circulated into the secret organization known as Quantum leads Bond to Haiti, where he encounters the two mainstays of all Bond films: a beautiful woman and a villain. The first is Camille (Olga Kurylenko), a woman whose scarred back hints at a mysterious past. The second is Dominic Greene, a global leader in eco-friendly business whose Greene Planet corporation has been busy buying up land to create conservation areas all over the world.
And here is where the film runs into trouble: the man in the black hat is… a businessman? Granted, Greene is also a sociopath, but he lacks the grand ambitions of the best Bond villains—indeed, he's not even the ultimate villain of the conspiracy, and a lot of the film feels like foundation-laying for a final installment in the story of the Quantum organization. And as one character remarks, "As one gets older, the villains and the heroes get all mixed up." But the Bond series has always been about escapism, something that calls for the clear division of good and evil. Even if a more subtle, believable villain makes for a better film—there are no space-based death rays or shark tanks—it also dilutes the history of the series, leaving us with a well-made espionage film that looks a lot like any other well-made espionage film.
Luckily, the casting of Bond films has gotten steadily better over the years. Greene is played by French actor Mathieu Amalric, seen to great effect as the paralyzed protagonist of The Diving Bell and The Butterfly, and his ability to flip from charm to glassy-eyed murderousness is an admirable bit of acting. And Craig is in the top tier of actors to take on the mantle, and arguably the closest approximation yet of Ian Fleming's spy with the "cruel mouth." Director Marc Forster is perhaps a more awkward fit; after the seriousness of The Kite Runner and Monster's Ball, he seems a bit reluctant to lighten the mood.
There are rumors that both Moneypenny and the gadget-master Q will return in the next installment of the series. With luck, their reintroduction will be handled with care; we don't need another car that can sprout wings and fly, but without a bit of the old song and dance, Bond just isn't Bond.
Rachel Getting Married
Directed by Jonathan Demme. Written by Jenny Lumet. With Anne Hathaway, Rosemarie DeWitt, Bill Irwin, Debra Winger, Tunde Adebimpe, Anisa George, and Mather Zickel. (R)
At the beginning and end of Rachel Getting Married, the troubled Kym (Anne Hathaway) is in rehab. What happens in between, during her sister's weekend wedding at the family's Connecticut manse, is a marvel of filmmaking so alive and immediate that you leave the theater regretting all you've never said to the family you rarely see.
Written by Jenny Lumet and directed by Jonathan Demme, the film is the story of a family less torn apart by tragedy than frozen in place. After years of not dealing with the fallout of the terrible accident that claimed a son, the simmering resentments that remain come boiling to the surface under the emotional upheaval of a wedding. Blame is thrown on one person after another, petty squabbles cover deeper issues, and scars that never healed quite right are ripped open again.
Kym has been in a rehab center for nine months before being let out to attend her sister Rachel's wedding. Before the short ride home is over, Kym and her father have begun a subtle battle for power—he, anxious and overprotective; she, desperate for a modicum of independence. When they reach the house, Kym drifts through it like a ghost, not even putting her bags down until she reaches the safe harbor of her old room, still hung with her tattered old tokens of rebellion.
The scene that follows gives you an idea that Demme and Lumet are doing something different. It's a dinner scene where friends and family of the betrothed are toasting the couple, telling alternately embarrassing and heartwarming stories about them. It's an amazingly long scene, one that feels much like an actual rehearsal dinner where it's likely not all the attendees know each other, but still feel a shared warmth. When Kym stands and gives her own cringe-inducing speech, it's certain to call to mind some particularly awkward moment with a distant cousin or uncle.
At that point, Kym still feels like a spoiled kid who has realized that always being a wreck means always being the center of attention. It's not a nice way to live, and Hathaway, to her credit, doesn't soft-pedal her portrayal; her Kym is a trial, a self-centered drama queen who whines when she doesn't get her way. Yet just when we begin to wonder why we should care, Kym's true history is revealed, and it casts her behavior—and the rest of her family's—in an entirely new light. With that, it moves from being a simple story of family strife into something much deeper; a study of all the ways we cope with disaster and heartbreak: the false front of happiness, the empty hope of being high, the sad isolation wrought by denial.
As Kym, Hathaway is better than usual, but the supporting actors do the best work here. Bill Irwin is wonderful as the father who refuses to delve too deeply into the past, and Rosemarie DeWitt moves easily between resentment and understanding. It's Debra Winger, though, who stuns as a mother who has quite consciously cut herself off from caring. "Take care of yourself," she says as she leaves the wedding reception, and though her tone is light, her meaning is literal.
At times it feels like Demme is a bit too in love with his own process; he so lovingly films the bright adornments and musical asides of Lumet's multicultural wedding (nearly all the guests are musicians) that it threatens to distract from the melancholy at the heart of the story. (It's worth noting that Demme is great at filming musicians, and has made films about Talking Heads, The Pretenders, and Neil Young, among others.) But with few exceptions, he pulls away before losing the main thread, and in the end, the brief discursions mostly serve to remind us that even the darkest hours aren't without light.
Also this week: Hartford's Real Art Ways brings a one-of-a-kind holiday story to town for a limited engagement. Christmas on Mars is the brainchild of writer/director Wayne Coyne (best known as the frontman for indie band The Flaming Lips), and it displays a nutty individuality that reminds you just how similar most movies are these days. That doesn't necessarily mean it's very good—the cast is made up largely of band members and friends with limited acting skills, and the decidedly low-budget production values are obvious at every turn—but it's almost certainly destined for a Rocky Horror-style cult status, where it will be trotted out each year for the Yuletide.
The story is a reimagining of the Christ story—here, human colonists on the red planet are planning a Christmas pageant to celebrate the first human birth on Martian soil. Unfortunately, some untimely suicides and the arrival of a mysterious Martian (Coyne in green makeup and antennae) threaten to derail their plans; it's up to Major Syrtis (another one of the Lips) to hold things together so his people can rejoice. Filled with the cheap-looking sci-fi effects of yesteryear and some truly bizarre touches (a marching band with genitalia for heads), the film is unlikely to displace A Charlie Brown Christmas or The Grinch as go-to holiday fare, but it's worth a look.
Finally, Amherst Cinema hosts a screening of The Airship, and a discussion with director Rainer Simon. Based on the novel by Fritz Rudolf Fries, the film tells the story of orphan Franz Stannebein, who has dreamed all his life of flight. His early experiments—strap-on wings—make him a laughingstock, but he eventually goes on to design a unique style of airship, only to find himself betrayed by the Nazi regime. Simon's style is one not often seen today—an impressionistic one that is far more filmic than most, making use of scratched negatives and other idiosyncratic touches—and this is a rare chance to see his work onscreen in Western Mass. The Airship screens at Amherst Cinema on Sunday, Nov. 23 at 2 p.m.
Jack Brown can be reached at cinemadope@gmail.com.
