Daniel Craig’s fifth and final outing as James Bond has got its final theatrical release date (fingers crossed, hopefully). The film titled No Time To Die will release on 8th October 2021. The spy thriller will be the first Bond film to be distributed internationally by Universal Pictures, who got the contract after MGM’s previous agreement with Sony Pictures ended.
No Time To Die was actually expected to release well before the coronavirus pandemic – back in November 2019. It then got postponed to February 2020 and then April 2020 as director Danny Boyle decided to opt out from the film and Cary Joji Fukunaga joined at the film’s helm. And then obviously the coronavirus pandemic hit worldwide, forcing MGM’s hand to postpone the film for a third time and release No Time To Die during November 2020.
No Time To Die became the first major film to be affected by the coronavirus pandemic, mainly due to the delays. Keeping the film in the books was eating up the producers’ money, but not releasing the film worldwide in theaters at atleast 75% capacity could cause the film to tank in the box office and very possibly even cause MGM to lose their Bond franchise. Because of this, the film was pushed again tentatively to April 2021. With that postponement, the British chain, Cineworld, the world’s second largest cinema chain, closed its cinemas indefinitely due to the continuous change in date of “expected blockbuster films” like No Time To Die.
But after much speculation and consideration, MGM has (again) changed the release date for a fifth and final time (hey, just like Daniel Craig!) to 8th October 2021 (hopefully). Bond films have generally been released during the October-November holiday period and it has almost always raked in heavy profits (when released during that time) in the box office. And since most experts are expecting the pandemic to have reduced significantly by then, releasing No Time To Die then is actually the smarter decision. Hopefully, everything goes according to plan (this time) and we will see Daniel Craig’s final outing on 8th of October in this year itself.
Léa Seydoux, Ben Whishaw, Naomie Harris, Jeffrey Wright, Christoph Waltz, Rory Kinnear, and Ralph Fiennes will return to reprise their roles from previous films alongside Craig, with Rami Malek, Lashana Lynch, Ana de Armas, Dali Benssalah, Billy Magnussen, and David Dencik joining the cast as new characters. The screenplay has been written by Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, Fukunaga, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge while Hans Zimmer provides the music.
The synopsis for No Time To Die is as follows: It has been five years since Ernst Stavro Blofeld was captured and James Bond has left active service. When his CIA friend, Felix Leiter approaches him to help him search for a missing scientist, Valdo Obruchev, he reluctantly accepts the mission. When it becomes apparent that Obruchev was abducted, Bond will confront a villain who will not hesitate to end the lives of millions.
Check out the trailer for No Time To Die down below: