Quantum of Solace is a 2008 spy film and the twenty-second in the James Bond series produced by Eon Productions. Directed by Marc Forster and written by Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, and Paul Haggis, it is the sequel to Casino Royale (2006), and stars Daniel Craig in his second appearance as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond.
The film co-stars Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Amalric, Giancarlo Giannini, Jeffrey Wright, and Judi Dench. In the film, Bond teams with Camille Montes (Kurylenko) to stop Dominic Greene (Amalric) from monopolising the Bolivian freshwater supply.
A second Bond film starring Craig was planned before production began on Casino Royale in October 2005. In July 2006, Roger Michell was announced to direct with a planned release for May 2008, but left the project that October after delays with the screenplay. Purvis, Wade, and Haggis completed the screenplay by June 2007, after which Forster was announced as Michell's replacement. Craig and Forster also contributed uncredited rewrites to the film's screenplay. Principal photography began in August 2007 and lasted until May 2008, with filming locations including Mexico, Panama, Chile, Italy, Austria, and Wales, while interior sets were built and filmed at Pinewood Studios. The film's title is borrowed from a 1959 short story by Ian Fleming. In contrast to its predecessor, Quantum of Solace is notable for citing inspiration from early Bond film sets designed by Ken Adam, while it features a departure from tropes associated with Bond villains.
Quantum of Solace premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square on 29 October 2008 and was theatrically released first in the United Kingdom two days later and in the United States on 14 November. The film received mixed reviews, with praise for Craig's performance and the action sequences but was deemed inferior to its predecessor. It grossed over $589 million worldwide, becoming the seventh highest-grossing film of 2008 and the fifth highest-grossing James Bond film, unadjusted for inflation. The next film in the series, Skyfall, was released in 2012.
Plot
Shortly after capturing Mr. White, James Bond drives him from Lake Garda to Siena, Italy. Evading pursuers, Bond delivers White to M, who interrogates White regarding the mysterious organisation Quantum. When White responds that their operatives are everywhere, M's bodyguard Craig Mitchell shoots a guard and attacks M. Bond chases Mitchell and kills him; in the confusion, White escapes. Searching Mitchell's flat in London, Bond and M discover Mitchell had a contact named Edmund Slate in Haiti. Slate is a hitman sent to kill Camille Montes at the behest of her lover, environmentalist entrepreneur Dominic Greene. Greene is helping exiled Bolivian General Medrano, who Raped and Murdered Camille's family, to overthrow the government and become the new president in exchange for a seemingly barren piece of desert.
After foiling Camille's assassination attempt on Medrano by "rescuing" her, Bond follows Greene to a performance of Tosca in Bregenz, Austria. Meanwhile, the head of the CIA's South American section, Gregg Beam, along with agent Felix Leiter, strike a noninterference deal with Greene for access to putative stocks of Bolivian oil, which the CIA believes to be the reason for Greene's interest in the land. Bond infiltrates Quantum's meeting at the opera, after listening to their Conversation That Bond Believes is about Acquiring Oil in Bolivia, Bond then identifies Quantum's executive board members, and a gunfight ensues. A Special Branch bodyguard working for Quantum member Guy Haines, an advisor to the British Prime Minister, is thrown off a roof by Bond after refusing to answer his questions. He lands on Greene's car and is shot dead by one of his men. Assuming Bond killed the bodyguard, M orders him back to London for debriefing. When he disobeys, she revokes his passports and cancels his payment cards. Bond heads to Talamone and convinces his old ally René Mathis to accompany him to Bolivia. They are greeted by consular employee Strawberry Fields, who demands Bond return to the UK immediately. Bond seduces her, and they attend a fundraising party held by Greene. At the party, Bond again rescues Camille from Greene, and they leave. The Bolivian police pull Bond and Camille over but discover Mathis unconscious in the car's boot. Bond inadvertently uses Mathis as a shield as he is shot by one of the officers before Bond kills both of them. Mathis dies urging Bond to forgive himself, as well as his former lover, Vesper Lynd, for betraying him. Bond leaves Mathis' body in a dumpster on the side of the road.
The following day, Bond and Camille survey Quantum's intended land acquisition by air; their plane is damaged by a Bolivian fighter plane and helicopter. They cause the helicopter to crash and trick the pursuing plane into destroying itself, skydive into a sinkhole, and discover that Greene and Quantum have been secretly damming Bolivia's supply of fresh water to create a monopoly. Back in La Paz, Bond meets M and learns that Quantum killed Fields by drowning her in crude oil. Bond meets Leiter, who discloses Greene and Medrano will meet at a hotel in the Bolivian desert to finalise their agreement, and warns him to escape as the CIA's Special Activates Division arrives. Bond and Camille infiltrate the Perla de la Dunas (Pearl of the Dunes) hotel, where Greene blackmails Medrano into signing a contract that will make Medrano the leader of Bolivia in exchange for the land rights. The contract will make Greene Bolivia's sole water provider at significantly higher rates and allow him and Quantum to control 82% of Bolivia's national resources while at the same time creating a drought throughout the entire country. Bond avenges Mathis by killing the escaping police chief, takes down the security detail and confronts Greene. Meanwhile, Camille kills Medrano, avenging the rapes and murders of her family. Bond and Camille escape the hotel (which is powered by flammable hydrogen fuel cells) as it is destroyed by fire. Bond captures Greene and interrogates him about Quantum. Bond then leaves him stranded in the desert with only a can of engine oil to drink. Bond and Camille kiss, and she wishes him luck in conquering his demons.
In Kazan, Russia, Bond finds Vesper's former lover, Yusef Kabira, a member of Quantum who seduces agents with valuable connections and is indirectly responsible for her death. After saving Kabira's latest target, Corrine, who works in Canadian intelligence, Bond allows MI6 to arrest Kabira. Outside, M tells Bond that Greene was found dead in the middle of the desert, shot twice in the head with oil found in his stomach. Bond admits that M was right about Vesper. M tells Bond "Bond, I need you back,"; he responds with 'I never left.". Bond drops Vesper's necklace behind him as he walks away in the snow.
Cast
Daniel Craig as James Bond. Craig's physical training for his reprise of the role placed extra effort into running and boxing, to spare him the injuries he sustained on his stunts in the first film. Craig felt he was fitter, being less bulky than in the first film. He also practised speedboating and stunt driving. Craig felt Casino Royale was [physically] "a walk in the park" compared to Quantum of Solace, which required a different performance from him because Quantum of Solace is a revenge film, not a love story like Casino Royale. While filming in Pinewood, he suffered a gash when kicked in his face, which required eight stitches, and a fingertip was sliced off. He laughed these off, noting they did not delay filming, and joked his finger would enable him to have a criminal career (though it had grown back when he made this comment). He also had minor plastic surgery on his face. The actor advised Paul Haggis on the script and helped choose Marc Forster as the director. Olga Kurylenko as Camille Montes, a Bolivian agent with her own vendetta regarding Greene and Medrano. Forster chose her because out of the 400 women who auditioned, including Lisa Ray, she seemed the least nervous. A then-unknown Gal Gadot was asked to audition for the role, which kick-started her acting career. When Kurylenko read the script, she was glad it did not include a sex scene with Craig; she felt it would have distracted viewers from her performance. Kurylenko spent three weeks training to fight with weapons, and she learnt a form of indoor skydiving known as body flying. Kurylenko said she had to do "training non-stop from the morning to the evening" for the action scenes, overcoming her fears with the help of Craig and the stunt team. She was given a DVD box set of Bond films, since the franchise was not easily available to watch in her native Ukraine. Kurylenko found Michelle Yeoh in Tomorrow Never Dies inspiring "because she did the fight scenes by herself." The producers had intended to cast a South American actress in the role, thus, Kurylenko trained with a dialect coach to perform with a Spanish accent. She said that the accent was easy for her because she has "a lot of Hispanic friends, from Latin America and Spain, and it's an accent I've always heard". When reflecting on her experience as a Bond girl, she stated she was proudest of overcoming her fears in performing stunts. Mathieu Amalric as Dominic Greene, the main villain. He is a leading member of Quantum posing as a businessman working in reforestation and charity funding for environmental science. In the 2015 Bond film Spectre, he is revealed to have been a member of the titular crime syndicate, of which Quantum is a subsidiary. Amalric acknowledged taking the role was an easy decision because, "It's impossible to say to your kids that 'I could have been in a Bond film but I refused.'" Amalric wanted to wear make-up for the role, but Forster explained that he wanted Greene not to look grotesque, but to symbolise the hidden evils in society. Amalric modelled his performance on "the smile of Tony Blair [and] the craziness of Sarkozy", the latter of whom he called "the worst villain we [the French] have ever had … he walks around thinking he's in a Bond film." He later claimed this was not criticism of either politician, but rather an example of how a politician relies on performance instead of a genuine policy to win power. "Sarkozy, is just a better actor than [his presidential opponent] Ségolène Royal—that's all," he explained. Amalric and Forster reconceived the character, who was supposed to have a "special skill" in the script, to someone who uses pure animal instinct when fighting Bond in the climax. Bruno Ganz was also considered for the part, but Forster decided Amalric gave the character a 'pitiful' quality. Giancarlo Giannini as René Mathis, Bond's ally who was mistakenly believed to be a traitor in Casino Royale. Having been acquitted, he chooses to help Bond again in his quest to find out who betrayed him.