DVD Review: ‘Quantum of Solace’

Quantum of Solace was released today on DVD and Blu-Ray. Last week I got home from work to find a package waiting for me that contained a copy of the DVD. It also contained a copy of the classic Bond flick, Never Say Never Again, which also came out on Collector’s Edition DVD today. It’s been a busy few days but I found some time to pop in the Quantum of Solace DVD.

I’m not going to review the film, since we already did that here, and the consensus was that the film is worth a look.  However, I will let you know about some of the bonus features. The film is being released in a single disc version, which only contains a teaser trailer, a theatrical trailer and a music video for the song “Another Way to Die† by Jack White and Alicia Keys. I personally am not a fan of the song or the music video. The 2-Disc Special Edition, which was the version I received, has what I assume the single disc DVD as Disc 1 and a second disc, which contains the bulk of the bonus features. There are a bunch of features listed but in my opinion, there are a few that are unnecessary.

The first and best feature of the disc is a featurette called Bond on Location, which runs about 25 minutes. This is a typical making of bonus feature but it focuses more on the exotic locales seen in the film and explains a lot of the work that went into picking the locations. I actually found a lot of it to be very interesting, plus you get to see a lot of behind the scenes footage of some of the great action shits in the film. However, the next 3 features are essentially useless since they focus on topics covered in the first feature and even use most of the same footage/interviews. They are also very short, 2-3 minutes. The next interesting feature in my opinion is the profile on the director, Marc Forster but this is unfortunately very short. There is also a very short music feature for anyone interested in briefly seeing how the scored was composed. The final feature, is the longest running about 45 minutes if you choose Play All. It is a series of behind the scenes videos that originally appeared online to promote the film. The feature is called Crew Files and each 1.5-3 minute file features a crew member talking about their experience and some of behind the scenes footage of that crew member on set. I really like this idea, especially since we hear from so many people from such diverse positions. There are a few crew files that reuse interviews and footage from the other features but for the most part, this is mostly new material. The Blu-Ray does not contain any extra footage, but I am sure the HD transfer is beautiful and may be worth it for such a visually stunning film.

Overall, this DVD is at least worth a rental if not a purchase. With such great visuals and setpieces in the film, I would have liked to see some features that focused on the stunts although we do get some glimpses of stunt work in the features the disc does have.

Make it a double feature and watch Casino Royale or take off a few days from work and make it a 22 feature marathon.

Jerry Cavallaro – www.AreYouStuckLikeChuck.com