No Time to Die

Starring: Daniel Craig, Rami Malek, Lea Seydoux, Ana de Armas, Lashana Lynch, Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw, Naomie Harris, Rory Kinnear, Jeffrey Wright, Billy Magnussen, Christoph Waltz
Directed by: Cary Joji Fukunaga
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Action, Adventure, Thriller
2021

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: Having left the service, James Bond (Daniel Craig) is reluctantly pulled back in when a mysterious villain threatens world peace.

Review:

Tim: I've been pretty vocal about how l feel like Daniel Craig's James Bond movies are fairly overrated. Craig is a good Bond, yes. His movies have underperformed in the quality department. Casino Royale is great, Quantum of Solace was utterly forgettable, Skyfall was vastly overrated, and Spectre was utterly forgettable. Not a very inspiring set of four films. Fortunately, I felt like No Time to Die was an improvement over previous entries. It has its flaws, but I believe it's Craig's second best Bond movie. That's not a bad way to end your time with the franchise.

This is probably a combination of Craig's Bond movies all feeling too similar, with the baggage of this being the 25th film in the franchise (not counting the unofficial ones). We've seen this all before. This movie follows the same path as the others- there's some decent set pieces, but the movie itself is overly long and not quite as exciting or as powerful as it needed to be. This movie does do a few things better than the others and there's enough here to make the movie feel somewhat differentiated. Still, it's hard for me to summarize the plot. There's a mysterious bad guy doing bad things and Bond is the only one who can stop him. It's fine, but it's frustrating to see how this franchise has lost of its event status. I absolutely see every Mission: Impossible movie in theaters because I can't wait to see what crazy stunts will show up. I watched this movie a few months after it came to streaming. I didn't feel like I missed out on much.

Daniel Craig is once again effective as Bond. I do like the more brutal tint he brings to the character. I wouldn't say his performance is great, however. It looks like he's thankful to be done with the role. I like Craig a lot, but I won't miss him in this part. I hope the next Bond actor is someone who will bring everything they have to the role. Craig is better suited in roles that actually interest him. Rami Malek is a worthwhile antagonist, but I felt like his character was underdeveloped. The opening scene helps just a little, but he wasn't particularly memorable. I don't know his name and his motivations were never all that interesting. The cast is too large, quite frankly, and I felt like Malek got shortchanged. It was fine seeing Lea Seydoux here, but it gave the movie a redundant quality to it. I don't think her character or performance is all that interesting, and she brought some of that lackluster quality from Spectre to this film. I didn't expect the emotional dramatic pieces between her character and Bond, so that was at least fairly intriguing. Lashana Lynch was solid in her role. I'm sure awful people will point to her as an example of the film being "woke", but I thought she gave a good performance and I enjoyed her partnership with Craig. She was certainly a more interesting part of the script. Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw, and Naomie Harris were all good, but they felt like carryovers from previous films. They didn't have as much to do here and felt included because they had to be. I always love seeing Jeffrey Wright and I believe he added a good amount of depth to the film. I loved seeing Ana de Armas here and love her continual rise to superstardom. She was one of the more exciting parts of the film and sadly, her screen time is too limited. She shows up just briefly, but it was for one of the film's standout sequences. Billy Magnussen did a surprisingly good job. He has that quality that makes you want to punch him, which was ideal for his role. I always enjoy seeing Christoph Waltz, but his role was minimal.

I know I haven't been gushing about this movie so far, but I believe No Time to Die is a really effective Bond movie. The action scenes are definitely stronger than the last three movies and I was really engaged through most of them. The whole film feels like a goodbye to the cast and I appreciated getting to check in with these actors one last time. Cary Joji Fukunaga does a good job balancing a bit of a bloated cast and story and he keeps the movie moving. The movie is absolutely way too long at 2 hours, 43 minutes, but Fukunaga's brilliance is that he keeps it from feeling too bad. I was mostly engaged and rarely lost focus during the film. It puts up enough interesting things where my attention was there throughout the movie. I was entertained.

I do think the movie might have been better with more left on the cutting room floor, but I enjoyed this movie significantly more than the previous three Bond movies. No Time to Die is a fitting end to Craig's 5 film run. I know others may disagree, but I still prefer Sean Connery and Pierce Brosnan to Craig. He's about on par with Roger Moore. Apologies to Timothy Dalton and George Lazenby. This was a worthwhile film and it showed flashes of what this franchise used to be. I'm actually thankful Craig is done with this role and I hope whomever steps into the iconic role next helps bring some of the fun back to these movies. Craig (and the movies') ultra-serious tone is a lot of things, but fun isn't one of them.



Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 7.5



If You Enjoyed This Movie, We Recommend:
Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, Skyfall, Spectre, Knives Out