NO TIME TO DIE STREAMING NEXT WEEK

 

It's now been confirmed that the new James Bond movie, No Time to Die will be available on the 9th November for streaming in the UK. The VOD, that's video on demand, will be available on Amazon Prime and HBO Max. 

The movie put in a disappointing showing at the domestic box office, but given the Covid crisis the movie did remarkably well. However, the US box office was more concerning and the movie underperformed on its opening taking $55 million when it was fully expected to rake in a minimum of $60 million.

However it must be remembered that  No Time to Die has already shot to £68.6 million ($94.7 million) in the UK. It was already the biggest movie  of the 'pandemic era'. The early jump to streaming will allow the movie to bring in more money, but it is doubtful that the EON originally intended to allow the film to make it's VOD transition so soon after the film hit the big screen; before, in fact, the film is released in all markets.

The Bond Conundrum

 

Starting with Dr No in 1962 and continuing until Die Another Day in 2002, the James Bond film series followed a loosely connected narrative that spawned twenty financially and mostly critically successful films, but then in 2006 the franchise rebooted itself with Casino Royale - it was from this point on that the James Bond films became a separate entity to what went before. And whilst Casino Royale is a good well made and well acted movie it is not, at least in the traditional sense, a James Bond movie.

And that would be fine if the producers stuck to that, but they didn't and Skyfall and perhaps Spectre very much want to be James Bond movies, in the traditional sense that is, whilst the latest Bond, No Time to Die is more soap opera with blistering action scenes than James Bond movie. It seems that the current producers want to have their cake and eat it. They want their movies to be James Bond movies and yet not be James Bond movies. It's a conundrum, indeed.

At the end of Die Another Day we were told that James Bond would return...we're still waiting.

Let's look at the recipe for Bond, the ingredients created way back when Ian Lancaster Fleming relaxed in Goldeneye for six weeks to write that first novel, Casino Royale: 

James Bond, the name considered bland and boring and pilfered from a bird book that Fleming owned.

Two parts womaniser.

Mix with one part cold, calculated, aloofness.

Add a lot of over the top villains with world domination schemes.

Toss in fast cars, good clothes and expensive cigarettes.

Stir in a good measure of sexism and misogyny.

Add a touch of toxic masculinity.

Bake solidly.

That recipe served the films well right up until Die Another Day. No matter what fashions came and went the Bond films remained essentially the same. 

Though that recipe has been amended by the current producers. They have come up with a low fat, gluten free version to carry the series forward, and whilst that may seem sensible in order to keep the franchise relevant it's resulted in all the flavours being removed. It's given us a very bland tasting Bond. They can have their cake and eat it. I don't want any of it.

The truth is that the Craig movies have been generic action films featuring James Bond in name only, with a few winks and nods to past glories - again they want their cake and eat it.

However, I will say that No Time to Die has been a fitting end to Craig's era. Since the Eon team have spent the past four movies trying to kill everything James Bond and this time they actually did kill Bond. Well, they have him commit suicide by allowing a pile of missiles to blow him to pieces.

How the Woke lot killed the SEXIST MISOGYNIST DINOSAUR

 

NOTE - THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS

Now that they've done the unthinkable, and  killed off James Bond the frenzy begins - will the next James Bond be a woman, a black man or a transgender man from a council estate or even  a bunch of angry overweight lesbians with guns. 

When Daniel Craig took over the role of Bond in Casino Royale the film was billed as a reboot when in fact it was a reimagining of the character - gone was the sexism, the harmless misogyny, the devil-may-care imperialistic nonsense that had originally birthed the character kicking and screaming from Ian Fleming's awesome imagination. It had been replaced by a kind of Bond-lite character -  the violence and action ramped up to impressive levels to disguise the fact that so much was missing of what actually made James Bond James Bond in the first place.

Quantum of Solace followed which was like watching a bloody video game with no attempts at the character building, or  the re-invention that the previous movie attempted. After that we had Skyfall, which at least almost felt like a Bond movie and will, I've no doubt, come to be regarded as Craig's best Bond. Then came Spectre, which was okay but nowhere near as good as the previous high point. And now there is No Time to Die, an overly long turgid movie that actually kills off the character of 007 in its climax. This is a definitive death scene too, not a trick death like that which opened one of the real Bond films, You Only Live Twice.

 Mind you no sooner do the credits roll that we are given  the promise that James Bond Will Return.

James Bond will return indeed - truth is we've been waiting a long time to actually see James Bond return and maybe in these Woke times we never will. The Bond of Casino Royale was a Bourne clone and he's continued down that road ever since.

Bond was always shorthand for stiff-upper-lip masculinity and flag-waving ideas of fashion, style and heterosexual lovemaking, and the increasingly demented Woke culture can't deal with that. They spend so much energy trying to be offended by Bond's macho nonsense that they forget the films are mere fantasies. No one is going to try and take over the world in such convoluted ways as Spectre, no one is going to irradiate all the gold in Fort Knox, and you can be sure that no one is going to turn up with their dwarf sidekick and bring about the end of life as we know it.

No Time to Die in its insistence on making Bond a real character give him a daughter he'll never see - yeah, that's right Bond is a daddy now - and have him heroically sacrifice himself to save mankind. He's carrying a deadly virus you see. The ending is as unambiguous as possible JAMES BOND IS DEAD.

Some will argue that he's been dead for at least the last five movies - the real Bond that is, the one that became the literary and movie legend in the first place. Fleming actually toyed with the idea of killing Bond himself but he decided against the move, and now the filmmakers have fulfilled on that idea and killed off Bond for once and all.

There is a BBC recording of Ian Fleming talking to Raymond Chandler HERE

Daniel Craig's rocky road to 007

 

Daniel Craig's latest and last Bond is raking in the cash and receiving mostly positive, even raving feedback - I've not seen the movie yet and initially wasn't going to bother, but given the news of the shock ending I'm going to see it next weekend.

So I thought now would be a good time to remember the fury Craig met when he initially took the role.

When Craig was first announced as the new Bond the naysayers immediately lamented the “blond Bond” and criticized his blue eyes. The London Daily Mirror on Oct. 15, 2005, ran his photo with the headline “The Name’s Bland … James Bland.”

At Craig’s first meeting with the press, he arrived via a speedboat on the Thames; he was wearing a lifejacket, which led to endless media mockery. Reporters were even more appalled that he chewed gum during the press conference.

Websites launched with names like, DANIELCRAIGISNOTJAMESBOND and BLONDNOTBOND.COM

The hostility shifted into high gear. The Sun newspaper reported that Craig had suffered sunburn that stopped filming of Casino Royale. It also was reported he didn’t know how to drive a manual car. “Craig’s 007 Can’t Get in Gear.”, the headline proclaimed.

“Craig confessed he doesn’t like guns,” said another British newspaper and then went onto report that he lost two teeth in a fight scene with “minor actors” 

This prompted Barbara Broccoli to announce: “His teeth are fine, he doesn’t have heat rash, and he’s not afraid of the water.”

Still Casino Royale” raked in $616 million worldwide, becoming the highest earning Bond film to date and regarded by many as Craig’s finest Bond outing. (By comparison, the final Pierce Brosnan film, “Die Another Day,” had earned $431.9 million.

Craig is the longest-serving Bond, at 15 years, though in fairness this is due to the fact that these days there is a long delay between movies and of course the Covid crisis held back the latest Bond film several times over.

As a Bond fan myself, I'm still not overly fond of Craig's version of the character but there's no escaping the fact he's been a massive success in the role.

Now...who will be next?

No Work for Daniel Craig lookabitalike.

 

This week the East Anglian Times reported about the worries of a professional Daniel Craig lookalike who actually looks nothing like Daniel Craig. For the last 14 years, Steve Wright has been making a fortune as a Craig lookalike but now that Craig has left the Bond role, the lookalike who doesn't really lookalike fears his work will dry up.

'Inevitably I'm not going to be as popular. People obviously want the current Bond, but I've been been 007 for the last 14 years so I'm happy to pass on the mantle.The same thing has happened to the Sean Connery and Pierce Brosnan lookalikes after all."

Mr Wright lost dozens of Bond jobs during the pandemic due to cancellations and it now looks as if it's going to get worse, as a new actor steps into 007's shoes. Maybe he can continue as a lookalike who looks nothing alike whoever the new Bond turns out to be.

The one thing Mr Wright won't miss is being chased at high speed by blokes who look vaguely like Blofeld.

Mr Wright is considered the world's best Daniel Craig lookalike....Here, at the Archive we are just not seeing it.

NO TIME TO DIE - THE BOND REVIEWS ARE IN.

 Last night, Daniel Craig's final outing as Bond finally premiered to mixed reviews, though most reviews are hugely positive.

The Times critic said: "Craig is a towering charismatic presence from opening frame to closing shot, and he bows out in terrific, soulful, style."

The Guardian reported: "It is of course a festival of absurdity and complication, a head-spinning world of giant plot mechanisms, but the film as a whole is very enjoyable and gleefully spectacular".

Time Magazine said: "At two hours and 43 minutes, it's too long and too overstuffed with plot - more isn't always better. And it features one of the dullest villains in the series' history, played by Rami Malek in mottled skin and dumb silky PJs.But forget all that. No Time To Die, its flaws notwithstanding, is perfectly tailored to the actor who is, to me, the best Bond of all."

Screen Daily said: "It's certainly a film that breaks many of the canonical rules of the series, though not entirely to dazzling effect. There's plenty to gawk at, and to argue over, in this episode, yet No Time To Die is oddly lacking in pleasure or real wit."

The Hollywood Reporter wrote: "It may not rank up there with Skyfall, but it's a moving valedictory salute to the actor who has left arguably the most indelible mark on the character since Connery,"

Empire Magazine wrote: This is a Bond films that ticks all the boxes - but brilliantly, often doesn't feel like a Bond film at all. For a 007 who strived to bring humanity to a larger than life hero, it's a fitting end to the Craig era.

It's time for No Time to Die

 The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) passed the long-awaited new 007 outing for release uncut, after finding that its scenes of “moderate violence” and “infrequent strong language” were suitable for children aged 12 and above.

No Time to Die will premier this week, and it looks as if Daniel Craig's swansong will be less brutal than previous outings.

The number of 18 and 15-rated films had dropped over the past decade with studios increasingly targeting family audiences to maximise box office returns

NO TIME TO DIE - THE LONGEST BOND FILM OF THEM ALL

 The 163-minute runtime confirms the rumor that “No Time To Die” is the longest Bond film in the franchise’s history. The 2015 “Spectre” was 148 minutes, with “Skyfall” and “Casino Royale” both over 140 minutes

No Time to Die/ No Urge to See

 

It's taken an age to get here - what with production delays and then the covid pandemic closing the world down, and now we're only days away from the 25th Bond movie hitting cinemas. A lot is hanging on the success of the movie, the cinema sector are hoping this film will be the spark that helps them recover after multiple lockdowns and EON productions have a lot riding on the success of the film - perhaps, the future of the franchise itself.

"We’re really hoping that this unlocks everything else and is very much the spark that makes everybody feel safe to return to cinemas,” 

I've seen every Bond movie in the cinema since The Spy Who Loved me - I was but a boy then - and now for the first time ever I feel ambivalent to a new Bond movie. I've never really liked Craig in the role, finding him boring but I still joined the queue for each movie as it came. This time, I'm not going to bother. Maybe I'll see it when the DVD comes around and catch it on one streaming service or other.

Why? Is it that I find the films tedious and lacking the spark of previous eras?

 Well, there is something in that - I consider Moonraker to be the worse of Roger Moore's Bond movies and yet I'd prefer to watch that movie than any of the Daniel Craig Bonds. Though, despite my lack of love for the latest Bond era I did love Skyfall and rate Spectre as pretty good too. I also think that the franchise has been heading back to the classic feel of the series since Skyfall - there's much more humour than there was in the Bourne-alike Casino Royale and the absolutely terrible Quantum of Solace.

Is it Covid fear? 

No, I don't think so. I've worked straight through the pandemic and am double jabbed. I'll visit a packed whisky bar in a heartbeat, I'm in the local library at least once a week and I'm still working, often driving a packed bus. So it's not a fear of the bastarding pandemic.

Is it the gimmicks the movie seem to have employed - making the new 007 a woman?

No, whilst I think it would be a step too far to bow down to the Woke lot and make Bond a woman. The code 007 can go to any agent, male or female and Bond is, of course in the movie and it's still a Bond movie. Anyway, it may be fun to see Bond teamed up with a truly strong female character. Though, it's a safe bet that Craig won't give the sexy new agent the benefit of some great 007 sex as Moore would have.  Remember, Mrs Ringo was a super tough agent in the Spy Who Loved Me, and yet she couldn't resist a little moore rogering. Whoops, sexist joke. I do apologise.

It's troubling that No Time to Die director, Cary Fukunaga recently told the Hollywood Reporter that Connery's Bond was basically a rapist. 

The scene Fukunaga is talking about is in Thunderball where Connery seduces a nurse (Molly Peters) in a playful scene where 007 basically promises to keep quiet about something that could cost her her job if she sleeps with him. I suppose you could see that scene as rape if you wanted to, but come on...it's really not.

Guess, they are still missing the point that Bond is basically a fantasy and not meant at all to be taken seriously.

Anyway, the Bond films have always employed gimmicks.

In short, I don't know why I just can't be arsed with this - maybe I've outgrown the movies. Maybe I'm out of time and long for the days when Roger Moore walked across the screen and fired down those famous gun barrels, when Connery purred as he seduced yet another fair maiden. I guess it's time to step aside and leave the Bond movies, at least those made in the last decade or so to those who love Craig's angst ridden spy and they are legion. Me, I prefer the past when a new Bond movie was really an event, when the Death Star was visually cutting edge, when Smokey and the Bandit tore up the celluloid roads and blockbuster movies  were fun. 

I guess the answer to the questions above is that I'm Too Old to Care.

Or am I?

Though in fairness to the movies Casino Royale did invigorate a franchise that seemed to have run out of steam, and Craig was hailed as the best Bond in many years. And yet most of his movie are forgettable whilst the older movies remain fondly in memory. Maybe this all new serious Bond was another gimmick. Maybe, fans didn't realise how much they would miss the over the top villains seeking world domination. Maybe the odd henchmen, the whimsical plots, the insane gadgets were the things that made the Bond franchise the powerhouse it was. 

All of those elements were the things that made Bond such a beloved fantasy espionage icon - in short, this was what made Bond Bond. All of these things seemed to separate Bond from other mindless action spectacles, but these days Bond, in the guise of being super serious is just another member of the pack. The women no longer make love to Bond but instead they are tortured and killed. Bond's witty quips are no longer fun - the movies used to be about escapism and beautiful locations with a martini or two thrown into the mix, but now they wallow in sombre moody landscapes, filthy basements and larger louts.

You know, maybe I'm not too old for the films after all - I guess I'm still a Bond mega-fan and I guess I always will be but the fact remains I'm not paying for a ticket to see John Mclane or Jason Bourne. I want to truly see that other guy - The name's Bond, James Bond.

No Time To Die will be released in cinemas on Thursday September 30, with the premiere taking place on Tuesday September 28