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The good news:

EON productions has continued its gritty, back-to-basics approach to Bond. There are even fewer space-age gadgets and flights of fancy in this one. This was incredibly successful when they re-booted the series with Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace does not backslide into goofiness.

I've heard some (including Roger Moore) mourn the death of whimsy in the Bond films. But consider the source -- Roger Moore made several of the worst Bond films in the series and is the actor most responsible for reducing Ian Fleming's brutal blunt-instrument of international espionage to a laughing stock parodied by everyone from Woody Allen (1967's spoof of Casino Royale) to MAD TV.

Taking its cue from the Bourne trilogy, the Bond series righted itself after Die Another Day, the worst of Pierce Brosnan's Bond films and a low point for the series. For my money Brosnan mostly got Bond right - an icy, brutal man in a nasty, dangerous job making life liveable by treating it as a race against boredom. But with Die Another Day they put him at the wheel and ordered him to jump the shark.

Because Brosnan's Bond started off so strong and was eventually pushed into ridiculousness I was afraid we'd see Craig's Bond begin the slow slide, drunk with the success of the last picture. I'd worried for nothing. Craig continues to impress. The plot's a bit more ambitious this time -- this one doesn't have the grounding of an original Fleming novel -- but it's clever and gets the job done elegantly. Bond's character continues to grow from his first mission as a 00-agent in the last picture to the more talented and controlled operator in this one. We return to an old theme for Bond -- he must do the right thing though governments will not -- but Craig plays it as though it's new.

The bad news:

Director Marc Forster (Monster's Ball,Finding Neverland) seems determined to prove his action chops - starting the film with a deadly car chase that is so dizzyingly fast and so jarringly cut together that you're often not sure what's happening until it's over. The disorientation-as-action thing continues through fist and gun fights, foot chases and into the fiery climax.

The Bourne films also used speedy-cuts and whiplash action to great, raw effect -- but they did it more masterfully. You never felt confused by them. Bond directors should remember that while The World is Not Enough, a little of this stuff goes a long way.

The film is also a little hard to follow if you didn't see the last one. Since most Bond movies have been self-contained this was a little annoying. Some flashback sequences were wedged in to fill in those who came in late -- but a Bond movie isn't part of some Lord of the Rings film cycle. It's not a Star Trek picture. You should be able to step in and enjoy it fully even if it's your first.

The theme song - "Another Way to Die by Jack White" and Alicia Keys -- also leaves something to be desired, though people saying it's the worst in history simply aren't paying attention. That honor would have to either go to Madonna's "Die Another Day," (sample lyric: "Sigmund Freud...analyze this!") or Duran Duran;s "A View to a Kill."

Rolling Stone gives the film 2 1/2 stars.

Roger Ebert says 2 stars.

Entertainment Weekly gives it a B.