How 007 was restored for Hi-Def

Over at the most excellent DVD Savant website, film critic Glenn Erickson has a fascinating article about the restoration job Lowry Digital did for the James Bond BluRay editions. In “To Hi-Def with Love: Restoring 007,” he relates how Lowry not only prepped the series for high definition video, but actually, on the instructions of Danjac, did a frame-by-frame restoration of the classic first three entries.

Glenn also makes some important points about a film restorer’s ultimate responsibility, vis-à-vis the Bond films, but applicable to all of cinema in general.

Terrific reading! Which you can do RIGHT HERE.

As an added bonus, he also has reviews of the Thunderball BluRay and the Casino Royale (1967) Collectors Edition DVD. Tell Glenn that HMSS sent ya!

Nobody at Sony Pictures is going to be missing any meals…

Quantum of Solace, already breaking box office records worldwide, is looking to do equally amazing business in the US, which isn’t one of the top markets for James Bond movies in the world.

As of 1:00 a.m. on Saturday, November 15, it looks like the film has grossed at least $26 million — paving the way for a staggering, but possible, $70 million opening weekend. Not too bad for a 46-year-old movie series!

Nikki Finke’s Deadline Hollywood Daily has the latest numbers. You can read all about it RIGHT HERE.

And for all you Bond fans who have some issues with the film itself, our best advice has always been: if you really, really hate it, then only go to see it twice.

QoS: A sampling of U.S. reviews

Let’s start with The New York Times’s A.O. Scott. He finds it a mixed bag including a “conceptually clever and visually grating” main title, and one action scene involving boats that “brings back painful memories of the invisible car that Pierce Brosnan tooled around in a few movies ago.” On the plus side, he says the locales have a “nice touristic effect.” And he says villain Dominic Greene is “one of the best in a while.”

To read Scott’s review, click HERE.

Then, there’s Joe Morgenstern in The Wall Street Journal. To say he didn’t like it is an understatement. First of all, he only devoted one paragraph (deciding to concentrate on reviewing Slumdog Millionaire). He says the film has “clumsy direction of a heartless script.”

To read Morgenstern’s (mini) review, click HERE and scroll down to the second review.

Separately, The Journal did a story about the literary Bond and how he’s different that the movie Bond. Click HERE to check it out.

Over at The Detroit News, count critic Tom Long as disappointng, only giving the film a grade of C. “’Quantum of Solace,’ the gritty, grim, stunt-stuffed 007 film that functions as a direct sequel to ‘Casino Royale,’ is certainly an action film,” Long writes. “But anyone who’s followed the franchise for more than a decade may walk away wondering, is it a Bond film?”

To take in the rest of the review, click HERE. `