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This week there’s only one new movie rolling out and it’s featuring “Bond, James Bond.” Wait a minute — they say Daniel Craig doesn’t say that line in Quantum of Solace, and they got rid of the “shaken not stirred” line, too. They seem to be turning this Bond franchise into an imitation of the Bourne franchise. The question is: with Quantum of Solace make Bourne-like numbers? Good question, to which we will have an answer to by weekend’s end right here at the Reject Report. For now, though, the big question is how this will do.

We might as well get on with the big preview of this week’s big wide release which is opening to no new competition at all.

Quantum of Solace is the 22nd James Bond movie from EON Productions, and the second one that stars Daniel Craig in the Bond role. It follows on the heels of the success of Casino Royale two years ago and picks up right where the last movie left off, with Bond mourning Vesper Lynd’s death and seeking answers to why she betrayed — and revenge for what happened to his one true love. Turns out that the organization that blackmailed Vesper is far more complicated and shady than expected: Quantum. Bond eventually hooks up with Camille (Olga Kurylenko) who leads him straight to Dominic Greene (Mathieu Amalric) of the Quantum organization. Bond is on a mission around the world where he must stop Greene in his tracks, and help uncover the truth about what went down with Vesper.

This flick has the usual jet-setting around the world as Bond goes to places like Italy, Haiti, Bolivia, Russia and Austria. But it sets a similar tone to the first Daniel Craig Bond flick in taking a more serious, darker view of the Bond character, and they got rid of a lot of the hallmarks of the Bond franchise along the way. Such as: less catch-phrases. Less gadgets. Less promiscuity between Bond and the Bond babes. And less humor.

I bring this up for a reason. It is obvious to me that the famous “reboot” of the Bond franchise that started with Casino Royale and continues here was designed to make this series more like the Bourne series of movies. No wonder. Keep this in mind: The Bourne Ultimatum made $69,283,690 in its opening weekend in the USA. The last Bond film Casino Royale made $40,833,156 in its opening weekend in the USA and grossed $167,007,184, the biggest domestic gross ever for the Bond franchise. So based on numbers like that I don’t see a return to the Roger Moore-style 007 movie anytime soon. Success breeds more success.

The big question is whether Quantum of Solace will do as well in the United States as it has been doing around the world, where it has been smashing records and so on. All this flick needs to do is beat the $47 million weekend haul of Die Another Day to claim the record for the top weekend ever for a Bond movie domestically, and this flick ought to be able to do that. A good question is whether or not this Bond flick will do as well in its opening as The Bourne Ultimatum did, or even as well as that Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa movie from last week.

I have my doubts. For some reason, audiences in the USA don’t seem to be as gaga over Bond as they are for Bourne, for some reason. So I think $69 million will be tough to achieve. As for matching Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa’s $63 million haul from last weekend, I have a hard time believing Quantum of Solace will even do that well, and for this reason. That last Daniel Craig Bond flick, as good as it was, still LOST at the box office for the opening weekend to Happy Feet. (Which may sound really embarrassing until you realize that Happy Feet actually won an Oscar). If Casino Royale couldn’t beat Happy Feet, there’s no chance Quantum of Solace does better than the funny animals’ opening gross.

So my fearless prediction is $61 million for Quantum of Solace, which rolls out on over 3,400 screens and has some midnight screenings going as well. I want to add just one more point. I wonder how much impact there will be from illegal downloading of this movie on the Internet? This movie has been out for two full weeks in the UK already. Surely, some of these die-hard Bond fans from North America will have seen this flick by now, thanks to these enterprising copyright infringers videotaping the movie on UK screens and posting them up on the Web, for all their friends across the pond to see? Really, the folks at Sony should have released Bond two weeks ago in tandem with the UK release. That would have eliminated all these issues.

We shall see. My prediction for Friday-Sunday:

That’s it for now. Back at weekend’s end when we count up all the loot Bond made, here at the Reject Report!. (Recession? Where?!)