No Time to Die (2021)

No Time to Die was the first film that I saw in a cinema since Brahms: The Boy II back in March 2020 just before the pandemic started. It was a great experience to sit in a cinema with a decent sized crowd on a Wednesday evening. No Time to Die is the last film to feature Daniel Craig as Bond and boy does the film feel like it. Originally it was supposed to be directed by Danny Boyle before leaving due to creative differences. It had a troubled production which saw the original release date in April 2020 before being pushed to October of that year and then again to April of this year before finally being released now. 

The main plot is that there is a chemical weapon that affect certain people or do whatever the plot needs it to do and the mastermind is Safin (Rami Malek) who at the start of the film kills a woman and saves a girl who has fallen through the ice that turns out to be Madeline meaning that when the film progresses he’s at least 20 years older than Madeline which is a bit of a stretch bearing in mind that Malek is 40 and Seydoux is 36. Anyway Malek is great in the film but Safin is a terrible villain. On the one hand the calmness that he shows is quite unnerving but his motives is largely dull. I never got the feeling that he was an effective villain and the only thing he did that seemed to have any edge to it was having Blofeld killed. 

The film has nods to On Her Majesty’s Secret Service with the tune of ‘All the time in the World’ playing and Bond willing to walk away. I have re-evaluated OHMSS over the years and think its way better than the film is given the credit for. The film has a theme of loss and its where the film ultimately falls a bit flat because it never felt like it was the right theme to include in Daniel Craig’s final film. 

There is plenty to like about this film. Daniel Craig is really good and goes out in style. He always felt like he was giving 100% even though it was his final outing. He knew how important it was to go out in style and he does that. I wasn't keen on Lea Seydoux in Spectre but found her to be really good this time. The addition of the child was a nice and natural evolution but in one way it was predictable that she was Bond’s. Christoph Waltz was wasted in this film and it was a mistake that they killed Blofeld off. Have him disappear for a couple of films but having him killed off was the wrong thing to do. That said Waltz’s scenes are really good and I thought that the scenes between Bond and Blofeld had more dramatic tension to them than Bond and Safin. Lashana Lynch gets a tough job in this as Nomi who is given the 007 status and it was one of the things that people hysterically latched onto when the news broke as if they were going to cast Lynch as Bond in this way. The double-o status is given to people and so it was always possible to give it to someone else and in the context of the film it made sense. I think Lynch did a good job as being the one who is Bond’s equal in many ways and warms to him towards the end.

No Time to Die isn't a terrible film by any means because its too well acted and its well directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga who directs some shots really well and Safin’s lair is really cool. Seeing Hans Zimmer’s name on the credits was a surprise and its a great score which is what you would expect form him. Billie Eilish’s theme song is also good although it was tough to hear some of the words she was saying. It did feel a bit mumblecore at times. At the end of the day I never felt disappointed with this film or found it boring like Quantum of Solace but its not Skyfall. What I would say is that its the best final film for a Bond actor and Daniel Craig is probably the best Bond ever because his quality output has been pretty good (bar Quantum).