Early theater listings indicate No Time to Die has the longest runtime for a James Bond movie yet. The upcoming film marks Daniel Craig’s fifth and final time playing Mr. Bond since he took over from Pierce Brosnan in 2006’s Casino Royale. Over the course of his run, the Bond franchise has grown increasingly interconnected, with 2015’s Spectre bringing the plot threads from Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, and Skyfall together for a story involving the titular organization and its infamous boss, Blofeld. According to costar Naomie Harris, No Time to Die will tie-up those threads for good, but with “massive, massive surprises”.
In addition to Christoph Waltz as Blofeld, No Time to Die will bring back Jeffrey Wright as CIA field officer Felix Leiter (following his last appearance in 2008’s Quantum) and introduce a new backstory for Léa Seydoux’s Dr. Madeleine Swann, connecting her to the movie’s villain Safin (Rami Malek). With so much ground to cover, it stands to reason Craig’s final Bond film may be one of his longest yet. In fact, it now appears it may be the longest Bond movie altogether.
Both the U.S.-based Regal and Pathe Netherlands are listing No Time to Die as 163 minutes long on the film’s tickets sale page. If accurate, that would make No Time to Die the longest Bond movie ever, eclipsing the previous benchmark set by Spectre (148 minutes). In either case, Craig can lay claim to starring in both the longest and the shortest Bond films ever, with Quantum holding the latter title at 106 minutes.
It’s worth mentioning this in no way guarantees No Time to Die is quite as long as these theaters are currently listing it. Case in point: last year, The Rise of Skywalker was seemingly confirmed to be 155 minutes long, but turned out to be 142 minutes instead. Still, assuming the 163 minute runtime isn’t wildly off, there’s a fair chance No Time to Die will be nearly as long or even longer than Spectre. In this case, the runtime would be justified; as director Cary Joji Fukunaga explained in a featurette released this week, the film is all about Bond making peace with everything he’s done and suffered (not to mention, everyone he’s lost) by completing his final and most challenging mission yet. It might not be as massive a conclusion as The Rise of Skywalker, but after four movies No Time to Die still has a lot of plot lines and character arcs to wrap up.
In addition to the returning characters, No Time to Die will also introduce new players like Craig’s Knives Out costar Ana de Armas as CIA agent Paloma and Lashana Lynch as Nomi, a younger 00 agent who challenges Bond’s outdated ways of handling things. Rumors to the contrary, however, Lynch reportedly won’t be replacing Craig’s Bond as the new Agent 007. The character is clearly important all the same and may call for some extended development, on top of everything else No Time to Die has to get done. Fortunately, it sounds like the film will have plenty of time to do everything but die (sorry, had to be done).
Source: Regal, Pathe Netherlands [via Games Radar]
- Bond 25 Release Date: 2021-10-08
