Quantum of Solace

Car chases, boat chases and airplane chases, oh my! Man that airplane chase was laughable and that part just completely lost me. They fall out of a plane, the chute hardly opens and there is barely a scratch on them? Right...Yeah, it was a lot of action and not a lot of feeling or emotion. In a film about revenge, both Olga and Bond are on their own personal vendettas, but there was an awful lot of not caring whether or not they were successful or not. Or how many people they kill along the way. There has to be a way to have an empty, unfeeling Bond, hellbent on revenge, but yet have the audience still desperately care if he succeeds or not. It felt like a weak sauce version of the Bourne Sequel. If you have to motivate a whole movie based on the revenge of a woman (cliche) at least make us care. Don't tell us a sad story about your family getting burned alive, show us it in the beginning of the movie. Than we are emotionally invested in her success and Bond's interference. The boat chase scene doesn't just look pretty, it rips at my heart and builds tension. I desperately care whether or not the burned little girl finally gets her revenge. The same with Bond. They needed to take us back and show us what he was fighting for. What images were lingering in his mind during his sleepless nights? What drives him?

This has been the biggest problem with action films lately. Watchmen is also guilty. They just want to look pretty and out due each other visual but they are boring because they are so emotionally vacant. This is exactly what Braun talks about in 516. You have to lead the audience. Give them a hint of the future that plays on their hopes and fears. We have to know what Bond is fighting for so that we know the stakes and care about what he has to lose. Lay out the mission so the audience is on board. There has to be a way to point to the mission without insulting the audience's intelligence. There is a fine line from suspense of not knowing and having to figure it out (mystery for the viewer) and giving them elements of the future that play on their hopes and fears. I have to play with this in my webseries. Find this balance through trial and error if you have to.

Marc Forster has done many emotionally resonant films. I loved Stranger Than Fiction so how come he forgot about people while directing an action film?