I'm a little torn. Some of it is sublime, both in it's technical qualities & it's acting/emotional heft, but there's so much weak connecting material that undermines it a bit for me. I'm also rather torn on how much it hits the beats of bringing back the old Bond movie elements that Casino Royale & QoS did so well with avoiding.
The screenwriting is kind of weak to me, the setup of the villain (and no mention of where his wordless band of constantly replenished followers come from, he's only motivated by a personal need for revenge semi-masquearaded as anti-establishmentism, so where does he attract this following from?) the whole handling of the hacking element, the dialog going back into so many quips and Bond even taking a moment in a dangerous situation to make a quip to NO ONE. I did like the humor, loved Naomie Harris, the way the screenplay intimated so much about Bond's past with so little (and how Craig handled it and each of the various sides of Bond's personality that are touched on in this movie, which are many). Also loved their treatment of Q, and I'm a big fan of Ben Whishaw and he does a great job here. Q's line about exploding pens stole the movie for me though. Bernice Marhole was kind of a non-entity compared with the depth of character they gave Olga Kurylenko in the last one, but she certainly looked gorgeous in that dress. Weird they cast a half-Asian actress & proceeded to strongly play up her features with the eye makeup.
Also was anyone else weirdly reminded of Batman Begins several times? The train smashing through concrete structures, the villain destroying the orphaned protagonists old, ancestral home, etc. Then look at Bardem's character & tell me he's not Julian Assange crossed with Ledger's Joker (with perhaps a little bit of Lisbeth Salander for good measure). Interesting how much inspiration Nolan takes from Bond, & now how much Bond has taken from him.
I'm also torn on the look of it, everyone was ready to worship the cinematography the day Deakins signed on, but overall I'd say Quantum of Solace had a more distinctive look to it, still more than any other Bond film (for QoS this goes beyond just cinematography, down to the graphic design of typography & invented user-interfaces for MI6). There certainly are sequences where Skyfall's photography blows away any other 007 film, the Shanghai sequence, Bond's approach to the casino in Macau, the whole Scotland denouement from Bond & M on the moor all through the night & especially the fiery haze surrounding the climactic moments; but outside of that & a few other shots it was more standardly composed, traditionally lit & occasionally throwing in some striving for iconography shots that seemed a bit strained for me (the long shot of M & the coffins, Bond from behind staring out over the old city of London, etc.). It's almost like they could only afford Deakins on the action scenes as the connective tissue between set pieces sticks out as significantly less interesting & could have been shot by a second unit on auto-pilot. Of course then again maybe Quantum has the edge here for me since 90% of that movie was action scenes
. But the opening credits were something special, I was a bit reminded of Mission Impossible - Ghost Protocol in how we were given a flash forward view of the film from the start in hints.
Thomas Newman's score was a pretty big let down for me except in a few choice moments, I wonder if David Arnold will end up with his job back since Mendes isn't sticking around for another installment.
Seriously, it might even surpass Casino Royale for me 
