SPOILER ALERT James Bond is temporarily dead, but that doesn’t stop the Oscar hopeful machine. With Academy voting ending tomorrow night and COVID still a factor, Hollywood is trying to reach the voters as best as they can. The # 1 tastemaker and actress/producer Colleen Camp hosted a Virtual Q and A with the team behind “No Time To Die” Barbara Broccoli, Cary Joji Fukunaga and Rami Malek. Director Amy Heckerling was the moderator.
Barbara first gave kudos to Daniel Craig’s swan song as Bond. “What he’s done over these 16 years, what he’s given to this franchise is amazing. Daniel was so committed to re-inventing Bond, to give him more humanity. This movie is really about love, which is unusual for Bond.”
Broccoli, along with her half-brother, Michael Wilson, controls the franchise. Cary Jo then remarked. “Even though it’s a large franchise, the core team was really a mom-and-pop thing, and telling the studio what we wanted instead of asking.” Amy mentioned that this film gives Bond a second chance at love. Cary Jo said, “With this tragic love story and the complexity and the layers, to come back for the final chapter and reexamine that relationship and that part of his heart, was all by design. We wanted this to feel like an arc over the course of the five films, with “Skyfall” in the middle, and have this feeling at the end that he’s come full circle.”
Broccoli noted that, “When Bond thinks Madeleine (Lea Seydoux) betrays him, it hits a button with him, it’s heartbreaking to him. Heckerling mused that. “it’s so satisfying yet heartbreaking to see Bond be in love and then sacrifice himself at the end.” Barbara also noted of the sensational of Ana de Armas, “She’s sort of like Ginger Rodgers, she does everything that Daniel does except backwards and in heels. “
Rami Malek said of his character, the evil Lyutsifer Safin, “The best way to get under Bond’s skin is to have a relationship with the woman he loves the most.” Rami also explained that he was intent on not meeting Craig before they worked together. “I didn’t want to meet Daniel until we had our first scene together. Of course, I stepped out of make-up trailer and we saw each other. He threw his arms around me and gave me a hug and said as any great leader does, ‘it’s going to be a great ride.” Here’s hoping “No Time To Die” gets some deserved Oscar love.
