Quantum of Solace: Bond’s Revenge

Really enjoyed this.
Much more character focused than the original.
Liked that overlong action sequences were trimmed.
Never bought the Vesper backstory, not in this nor in the original.
Bond is a sexual predator, he would never get emotional about anyone.
Maybe M.
So when Vesper's ghost appeared, I crinkled a bit.
That said, the video insets were nicely done. Slick.
To me, QS remains the weakest of the Craig 007s, but
I enjoyed this far, far more than the original.

This has saved this movie for me.
Just wanted to say, thank you for the hard work!

Review by steelio2006 — June 21, 2011 @ 3:28 pm

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by havok1977 — May 27, 2011 @ 5:34 am

So I felt in the mood for some Bond tonight, and of my pending fanedit queue i decided to go with this release from LastSurvivor; whom I’ve gotten a bit acquainted with lately due to his feedback of my work in progress.

Bearing in mind that these are just my personal opinions with no other intent than expressing myself, lets dive right…

VIDEO quality: Very good. I could not notice any significant difference between this and most of the SD discs that I own.

I see that Aztek mentions an issue with different speeds which are not noticeable to me, PAL to NTSC conversion is something I have not personally dealt with and can not really make a proper assessment. In full disclosure I watch DVDs using an upscaling stand alone player which does some nice signal cleaning, which could be a mitigating factor.
With this present I still give video a 9/10

AUDIO quality: Again it is great, this being made off fairly recent and high profile/budget movies means that the audio sources should and are of prime quality. The editing is flawless with no noticeable issues even thou there are some significant replacement of dialogue lines at many spots in the edit. Much effort and patience goes into accomplishing this level of polish and so: 10/10

EDITING / ENJOYMENT : LastSurvivor took on a movie which I hoped someone would fix and I have to say that his labors yielded quite a good final product. Here are some points i would like to highlight:

- The whole reason for this movie to exist is Vesper and Bond’s truncated relationship, his subsequent grief and the way he deals with what happened. It is a good thing to bring this to the foreground, and I felt that the new pre-credits sequence does a great job at this (the use of B&W and color was quite effective here)

And yet I felt the hammer falling on my head too often hitting me with the same point during the rest of the edit than I think is good – specially the flashback at the Opera house, which in turned made the escape feel non existent.

- Still about the opening sequence, I felt some more of the actual car chase was missing, just a tad. And a small thing that should also be mentioned is that during one of Vesper’s voice overs she is actually in frame with her lips out of sync, and it just felt a bit off.

- Fine choice with the theme song, it fits very well; kudos to the person whom you mentioned suggested it. To be honest I walked in biased here because I have never cared for the pop singer behind it, expecting to hate it; guess it would have been one of those cases of better off not knowing

- A great job was made to tone down the speed of the many action sequences that are present in the original release by using a clever choice of music and a semi slow camera that makes things feel somehow more real, yet I felt that the last one did not need so much of this treatment and therefore did not have the impact i would have expected, and the small flashback for Camille in there felt out of place to me.

- As it was surely planned, by consequence of the action sequence rearrangement the rest of the movie has a much better pace and the actual spying is properly showcased now. Very well done.

- There is a change in the final act that was honestly not to my liking: Greene’s fate. I understand that this is a matter of personal preference, but I have to say that I preferred the original version.

Because of these opinions, for me this is a 7/10.

DVD Authoring: efficient and right up my alley

Final score for me: 8.5/10. Original: 6.5/10
All in all I did quite enjoy the new take and the disc will have a place on my fanedits shelf

Overall I enjoyed this edit and I think it helped the movie. There's not a lot to work with, so only so much can be done.

First, the good. Adding in the gun barrel Bond trope fits--it is kind of odd to not have it. Replacing the theme song was a decided improvement; I'm not 100% convinced of the P!nk song but it fits overall and is a massive improvement over the awful original.

Trimming the action sequences works. This is a Bond film, not a Bourne film, so the chases and fights shouldn't be the focus. In particular the opera sequence is fantastic IMHO. Going slow motion with just the music track get across the brutality of the fight without getting in the viewer's face about it. The Vesper flashbacks generally works. Same goes for the final hotel fight, though it isn't quite as effective. The technique helps to highlight Bond's state of mind.

Having a callback montage at the beginning is a good idea since this is a rare actual sequel film. Which segues me into the criticism. The initial sequence felt overlong. Probably picking up a couple of short clips then right to the sinking elevator and aftermath would be enough--not a summary of the entire Casino Royale.

Moving the Sienna chase to before the opening credit sequence also didn't work for me. It moved the credit sequence too far into the film--15 minutes or so in? It felt wrong.

As mentioned, some of the flashbacks to Vesper were a bit abrupt, even if appropriate.

With the cutting, the thin story and weak villain became almost secondary. It started to become more of Bond ignoring M's orders and avoiding getting caught by her and the other agents. Again, not much to work with here.

In the end I did enjoy the edit and it works, it's just not my favorite work by Last Survivor.