James Bond.

If you've been a consistent reader of these pages you'll know that I lie somewhere between "big fan of" and "massively obsessed with" the suave secret agent. With that in mind, let's talk Quantum of Solace.

Now, this isn't, strictly speaking, a review. It's very much more my thoughts on the new film presented in a not quite coherent, but more or less cogent, manner.

Let's get this out of the way instantly — it was a good movie. It was a solid action flick that, despite some people's complaints, didn't skimp on the plot. It just required the viewer to actually pay attention to what was taking place. If you sat there and watched it you weren't beaten over the head repeatedly with the super-villain's scheme to dominate the world. The scheme was explained in bits and pieces over time and the viewer had to put it all together.

Good for the Bond franchise! They actually decided that people can take some time and figure it all out for themselves rather than smacking the viewer in the face. I appreciated that, it puts the audience very much more into the role of Bond trying to work out what's happening. It draws the viewer in.

As for the action itself… I'm not going to lie to you, I’m a huge fan of the series and I understand exactly why they filmed the action sequences the way they did. I just wished that they hadn't. It's become very en vogue to do action scenes with a handheld camera very close in on what's taking place and with incredibly rapid jump cuts. That's what Marc Forster opted to do with the film and I think it was a bad decision.

It's true that like the plot itself, the quick jump cuts and close-in, handheld shots serve to draw the viewer in and leave them just as breathless as the combatants, but it does a disservice as well. It's a style that, sadly, translates much better to the small screen than the big one (the eye is faster taking in information on a TV-sized screen than a theater-sized one). Directors and editors seem to have forgotten that even though they're editing these things digitally and can put in as many cuts as they want, sometimes more cuts doesn't mean a better film. If you sit in the editing room and watch something 50 or 100 times you're going to have a much better idea of what's happening than the poor viewer seeing it unfold once on the screen (it also helps if you were there when the thing was being filmed so you know what actually took place).