This bothers me
I went to see Quantum of Solace with some friends from high school over the weekend. They were pretty big 007 fans, and they were disappointed at the overall tone of the movie and the portrayal of Bond. I, however, was disturbed by the hotel.
So towards the end of the movie, the Big Bad of the movie meets with a corrupt South American general to discuss a coup overthrowing the government of Bolivia. They meet at a hotel in the middle of the desert. This hotel happens to be powered by "fuel cells", represented by little tanks of what I can only presume to be propane mounted in every single room. This provides for a spectacular visual effect when Bond & Co. storm the hotel, and all the "fuel cells" blow up.
What bothers me is the following:
1. From the ensuing scenes both depicting the meeting and the fights thereafter, we see that the hotel is HUGE. It could easily have housed hundreds of visitors. It is also very fancy, with all sorts of artistic-looking glass panels surrounding their luxurious meeting room. It would not have been out of place next to the Guggenheim Bilbao. (Or Berry Library, for that matter.) The thing is, it's in the middle of the desert, and it's clear from the action sequences that no one is there except for the small cabal of conspirators. The villain was portrayed as a heartless capitalist. How does a hotel like that make money for him?
2. The exploding fuel cells. Why? Once again, you're in the middle of the driest desert on the planet. You're easily within the tropical zone. You apparently have a shitload of real estate, enough for hundreds of tourists that (once again) will probably never visit (actually more land than that, once you execute your deal with General What's-His-Name). You are pretending to be a bleeding-heart environmentalist. Why not use solar panels? You're in one of the few places on earth where that might actually make economic sense.
3. OK, so you decided to make a huge fancy private hotel in the middle of the desert, just for you and your cronies. You've decided to spend a shit ton of money to build the infrastructure necessary to bring natural gas to power "fuel cells" in a region that was already established to be poor in these resources. How did you fail to build any safety precautions into your interconnected system of highly explosive materials? Sure, you didn't expect a SUV to ram straight into (what appeared to be) the main fuel cell. But surely this system must have been built to last! Surely you must have expected something to fail during the expected lifespan of this giant hotel. Was the whole thing supposed to just blow up at the slightest spark? Could you at least have built a fire-suppression system in the damn place?
I guess that I can only let suspension of disbelief go so far without becoming disgusted. Especially when it's so blatantly an excuse for things to blow up.
So towards the end of the movie, the Big Bad of the movie meets with a corrupt South American general to discuss a coup overthrowing the government of Bolivia. They meet at a hotel in the middle of the desert. This hotel happens to be powered by "fuel cells", represented by little tanks of what I can only presume to be propane mounted in every single room. This provides for a spectacular visual effect when Bond & Co. storm the hotel, and all the "fuel cells" blow up.
What bothers me is the following:
1. From the ensuing scenes both depicting the meeting and the fights thereafter, we see that the hotel is HUGE. It could easily have housed hundreds of visitors. It is also very fancy, with all sorts of artistic-looking glass panels surrounding their luxurious meeting room. It would not have been out of place next to the Guggenheim Bilbao. (Or Berry Library, for that matter.) The thing is, it's in the middle of the desert, and it's clear from the action sequences that no one is there except for the small cabal of conspirators. The villain was portrayed as a heartless capitalist. How does a hotel like that make money for him?
2. The exploding fuel cells. Why? Once again, you're in the middle of the driest desert on the planet. You're easily within the tropical zone. You apparently have a shitload of real estate, enough for hundreds of tourists that (once again) will probably never visit (actually more land than that, once you execute your deal with General What's-His-Name). You are pretending to be a bleeding-heart environmentalist. Why not use solar panels? You're in one of the few places on earth where that might actually make economic sense.
3. OK, so you decided to make a huge fancy private hotel in the middle of the desert, just for you and your cronies. You've decided to spend a shit ton of money to build the infrastructure necessary to bring natural gas to power "fuel cells" in a region that was already established to be poor in these resources. How did you fail to build any safety precautions into your interconnected system of highly explosive materials? Sure, you didn't expect a SUV to ram straight into (what appeared to be) the main fuel cell. But surely this system must have been built to last! Surely you must have expected something to fail during the expected lifespan of this giant hotel. Was the whole thing supposed to just blow up at the slightest spark? Could you at least have built a fire-suppression system in the damn place?
I guess that I can only let suspension of disbelief go so far without becoming disgusted. Especially when it's so blatantly an excuse for things to blow up.