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Olga Kurylenko Discusses 'Quantum of Solace' With IGN

The 'feisty' Camille, how she got the role, physical training and more...

Continuing with this week's series of interviews with the stars of QUANTUM OF SOLACE on IGN is today's feature on Olga Kurylenko. Not a great deal of new information but a bit more detail on her weapons training and action sequences.

I do fighting, stunts for fight scenes, I do body-flight, which is very physical - everything hurts after that. You come out of the tunnel and your whole body hurts. Work with weapons, car driving - it's a real action movie.

I've tried a few [weapons], but I hadn't tried an automatic machine-gun before and that's pretty impressive. But mainly guns.

What the frick is this chick up to?

I wish my job were like that.

Seriously, everybody. What's the deal with Olga's character? All this weapons and high-action training? Rationally, I know that she's not going to be a Jinx reprise. There's no way that would ever slip through the quality gates of Haggis and Forster (and Craig). Even a Wei Lin type seems much too shallow and predictable for what I'm expecting from the team. But then what's up with all the combat training? Who is she? If she's half as badass as she appears to be training for, how is she not going to be <sigh> another “Bond's equal”?

Who cares as long as the movie's as good or better than the last one.

"...fight scenes, machine-guns, real action movie..."

Oh dear...
Ok, I´m not worried...well maybe just a bit



You know? Since the press conference I can´t stop re-watching CR and I´ve now come to the conclusion that´s going to be a really hard act to follow. But I think that it´s doable. Everything so far sounds wonderfull except all this fighting girl stuff. Oh well, wait and see I suppose.

Well, deeply embedded in my post was the point that:

IF she is indeed “Bond’s equal” as it’s come to mean... THEREFORE it follows that the film CANNOT be as good as, much less better than, the last one.

I agree. I think the problem with Jinx was that, the actress was too well known, and the dialouge was terrible. Now, we have Olga Kurylenko, an unknown actress and I think, since Haggis is on board the script will be top notch. I have no worrys, aslong as she doesn't try to steal the movie.

I want somebody to answer this.

Yeah, there's no way she's Jinx II.


Well, bad- does not necessarily equal bad. In fact, I'd argue that neither Jinx or Wai Lin ever achieved "cool" or "bad-." The writers were too caught up as presenting them as the "female Bonds," which got in the way of letting the characters just do their own thing. It's fine to have a female who is capable in combat, as long as you just don't make a point of overstating it and make her a compelling character in her own right.

And it's interesting to note that nowhere in this product has Camille been oversold as the "Bond's equal" character, which occurred with Wai Lin and Jinx. They're not trying to advertise her character that way, which means they're up to something different. Given the comments about her character role (she has her own vendetta, and she's going to help Bond with his feelings about Vesper), she strikes me as being of a different substance than what we've had before.

That´s True, no "Bond's equal" comments this time.

I totally agree. Wei Lin, though tough, was the most boring Bond girl ever in my book. Jinx was not a badass. Bad? Yes. An ? Yes. But the two never met.

I appreciate your optimism, Harms, but I’m having a hard, hard time imagining what a well-written co-leading, machine-gun toting female looks like. Ripley? Sarah Connor? I don’t want either of them near Bond. I want Bond to be the sole hero! It’s not too much to ask, is it, after TND and DAD?

Anyway, I guess it’s a question of faith – something I’m not totally unfamiliar with. I know what Haggis can do, and I trust in what I’ve been hearing about Forster. The 2nd unit is strong, and Craig seems to know a good script when he sees one. I will move forward with an optimistic heart, but know that this particular development has me certainly more mystified than anything else we’ve heard about QOS to date.

Okay, here's an imaginary, not very impressive, backstory for Camille that might give you a sense of what her character might be like that I think doesn't feel anything like a Ripley/Sarah Connor character would (those are pretty mannish characters, after all, and also imply a lot of machine gun usage):

Imagine Camille as a modern Fiona Volpe (who actually is bad-, with her motorcycle rocket and all), working for Dominic Greene. She helps him take care of the dirty work, sometimes as an assassin, sometimes as other things. But for whatever reason, Dominic Greene betrays her and now she's out for blood.


Again, I think that's the case. Why do we think he wouldn't be? Again, they're not pushing Camille forward as a "Bond's equal" character.