My name is Mason Porter. I am a Professor in the Department of Mathematics at UCLA. Previously I was Professor of Nonlinear and Complex Systems in the Mathematical Institute at University of Oxford. I was also a Tutorial Fellow of Somerville College.
Saturday, September 06, 2008
Annoying movie subtitle
I was at the theatre today to see Hellboy 2 (which I'll review briefly when I go through lots of media in a subsequent post that I swear I will write eventually). While there, I noticed a poster for the new Bond film, which will come out here on October 31st. I'm obviously very interested in seeing it, but its subtitle ("Quantum of Solace") really annoys me and (less relevantly) seems to break from the Bond subtitle formula. Maybe the subtitle of the 2010 Bond film will be "Strangled Perturbations"?
This doesn't really bother me. It sounds to me like they're just using "quantum" in the older (pre-QM) sense of the word, meaning something like "amount". (My Mac's dictionary gives "quantum of compassion" as an example.)
ReplyDeleteAccording to Wikipedia it comes from the title of an Ian Fleming short story involving Bond, which seems perfectly consistent with the naming of previous Bond movies.
It's certainly true that if it weren't for QM the title wouldn't annoy me. What can I say: I'm an elitist.
ReplyDeleteMason, do you get cranky when other physics terms are used in their original meanings? Travis is correct, in the short story the term is used in a way that has nothing to do with physics.
ReplyDeleteThis new movie gets a big preemptive "ugh" from me, though. It (a) looks like a rehash of early Moore movies (avenging Vesper instead of Teresa), (b) sounds pretty freakin' stupid, and (c) has fuck-all to do with the story which donated the title. Granted, the story can't be made into a movie - it's just an after dinner conversation between Bond and a friend.
The next two films will probably be "Risico" and "The Hildebrand Rarity", btw. AFAIK, _For Your Eyes Only_ is the only Fleming short story collection, which means those are the only two Fleming titles which haven't yet been used.
I can get cranky from just about anything, so why not? ;)
ReplyDeleteActually, the ones that irk me are the ones that get frequently misused that I tend to have an automatic reaction.
I think I should take a look at that collection. I'm curious how the stories read.