No Time To Die Review

 

 

 

 

 

Well, time for a new review and this one is on the latest James Bond film, No Time To Die, which was heavily delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic and was finally released last month (or was it September??).

So, as Daniel Craig's swansong in the role of James Bond, how does it fair??? Well, lets find out!

And the usual warning is coming...

PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD (NOT TOO MANY THOUGH!) 

STORY 

And I've quoted some of the plot summary from Wikipedia below.

"In the past, a young Madeleine Swann witnesses the murder of her mother by Lyutsifer Safin in a failed attempt to murder her father Mr. White. Madeleine shoots Safin, but he survives. She flees onto a nearby frozen lake and falls through the ice, but he rescues her.

In the present, after the capture of Ernst Stavro Blofeld, Madeleine is in Matera with James Bond. Spectre assassins ambush Bond when he visits Vesper Lynd's tomb. Though Bond and Madeleine escape the assassins led by Primo, he believes she has betrayed him, despite her pleas, and leaves her."

The story then cuts to 5 years later, where MI6 learn of a new threat, which is a bioweapon that is coded to a victim's DNA, which can kill them instantly and Safin has gained access to this weapon with the intent on mass producing it to kill millions. And so its up to Bond to try and stop him...

THOUGHTS

As a swansong for Daniel Craig, No Time To Die is a very entertaining Bond film that features plenty of intense action as well as some surprisingly emotional moments that you don't often get in many other 007 films. The film also has some real moments of intensity and in particular its opening sequence is perhaps one of the most chilling and suspenseful. However what I found also quite surprising about the film is the depiction of Bond himself as he become more humane and less of a ruthless killing machine like he was in Craig's other films and at least Craig has found Bond's humanity and care for others around him, not to say that he didn't care in his previous films to an extent but here things hit home more, which is one of the film's best aspects.

PERFORMANCES (No notable scenes but the odd plot reference may come up!)

As for the performances, the cast are all on excellent form. 

Starting with Daniel Craig who is great in his final performance as James Bond and I actually think this is his best performance as Bond, as here he scales back the ruthlessness of the character and shows a more human side to him as someone who does care for his friends and partner, Madeleine. Craig also has some nice moments of banter with the other cast members and good lines and its good to see him finish the role the was he has. 

Lea Seydoux also does an excellent job in her role as Madeleine Swann, Bond's partner, whom Bond has a troubled but ultimately fruitful relationship with. Lea has a key role in the film as Madeleine in that her character is tied to the main villain, Safin right from the beginning with Safin hunting her as a child. 

Rami Malek is pretty good too in his role as the main villain, Lyutsifer Safin, who is out for revenge over the SPECTRE organisation, who were responsible for the deaths of his family and later plans to use the bioweapon called Herceles for his own evil needs. Malek also affects a creepy accent that works well in the film and even though he isn't the best Bond villain, he still ranks as a decent one. 

Lashana Lynch also does well in her role as the new "007", Namoi, who replaced Bond after he retired from MI6. And Lynch playss the role well and is somewhat surprisingly ruthless in the later stage of the film and proves she is not to be messed with just like Bond. 

WARNING: PLOT SPOILER COMING UP!

Ben Wishaw also makes a welcome return as the younger Q, who of course works for MI6 and provides agent with special gadgetry. This time round they also even give away Q's sexuality as being gay as there is one scene where is preparing to cook at home for a date with another man but is interrupted by Bond and Moneypenny. Wishaw also provides some nice moments of comic relief too in the film as you would expect from Q. 

Naomie Harris is also very good as she reprises her role as Moneypenny, who is M's secretary and plays her part in the role of helping Bond find Safin. Harris also has the uniqueness of being the only version of Moneypenny to have shot James Bond.

Jeffrey Wright returns also to the film in his role as Felix Leiter and he does an excellent also and the film nicely establishes Felix's friendship with Bond. And there is a rather emotional scene between the two of them, which I won't go into here but again this is a rather emotional film. 

Christoph Waltz makes another return here as Blofeld althoug he doesn't appear in the film for long, he still makes a very creepy and effective impression in the scenes that he is in. Blofeld however here is locked away in MI6's custody but that doesn't mean he won't still cause chaos. 

And last of all is Ralph Fiennes as M (or Mallory) who is the head of MI6 and Bond's superior, who play a slightly dubious role here in his involvement with ther Herceles bio-weapon but ultimatley he is working with good intentions to stop Safin's evil plans.

DIRECTOR

As for the direction, Cary Joji Fukunaga, a Japenese-American director, does a fine job here in his first Bond film and he confidently handles the action scenes and delivers on providing an emotional conclusion to the film and the Craig era. Fukunaga previously has worked on films such as an adaptation of Stephen King's IT and TV shows such as True Detective. 

MUSIC 

As for the music score, it is by none other than Hans Zimmer, who provides a pretty decent score overall even if it isn't one of his very best. However it is still well suited to the film and thankfully doesn't have any annoying bombastic "BWAMMM!" moments that we have come to expect from Zimmer's movie scores in recent times. The theme song is sung by Billie Eilish and its actually quite good and Eilish's voice is great and has a chilling quality to it. 

FLAWS (Warning: this section may contain spoilers!)

As for flaws...yes No Time To Die does have some to an extent.

WARNING: BIG SPOILER COMING UP!!!

For starters I think I have to make mention of the film's most controversial moment, which is of course Bond's death, which I'm sure split many fans and pissed off quite a few that they decided to kill him off. And this does leave the franchise with a bit of bind (or should that be without a Bond lol!) as where can they go with the series now that Bond has been killed off??! I mean, they could just reboot the franchise again with another actor as Bond and develop a new set of films around that, which would vary from Craig's era. It has to be said there is no real consistency in the series from Craig's era to the film's that proceeded it after all. 

It also raises the question of the "007" code name, which has always been associated with Bond but this film showed that any agent could have that code name applied to them as we see with Naomi. And they could of course based a new 007 on a different agent altogether, even a female one, which obviously would not be Bond or maybe a relative, Jasmine Bond or Jennifer Bond maybe?! ;-) 

So, I personally wasn't too offended by the death of Bond but ultimately I was a bit surprised at first that they went with it as it really does leave the prodcuers with a quandry as to where they can go next or what to do in the future with the franchise. 

I also felt that Safin while he was suitably creepy as a Bond villain, he still wasn't one of the better ones overall in the grand scheme of things. Also Safin wasn't really a physical match for Bond but then few them actually are as its usually their capacity for psychopathy and ruthlesness is what makes them villains rather than their brawn. 

I also had a minor complaint regarding Madelieine's character as she was always alot more serious than Vesper was, who had a lot more charm to her than worked so well with Bond but Madeilene here is more grim-faced most of the time. It makes you think that Bond's relationship with her kind of lacked that firey chemistry he had with Vesper and he needed someone a bit more light hearted that he could work off. 

Anyway that's it for the flaws.

SUM UP 

To sum up, No Time To Die is an enjoyable and fitting end to the Daniel Craig era of James Bond and Craig himself gives his best performance in the role showing both Bond's toughness but also humanity and the supporting are also excellent. The action scenes are also pretty intense and well staged and the film also has one of the most suspenseful opening sequences of any Bond film. 

It does have some issues of course with Safin being a somewhat average villain in the scheme of the franchise's villains and the ending proved to be quite controversial and leaves a big question mark over where the franchise can go next. 

However with that all aside, No Time To Die is still well worth checking out and a solid swanson for Daniel Craig.

So, I will give No Time To Die...

8 out of 10 

Right, that's it for now and I will be back soon with another review.

Until then, bye for now!