Daniel Craig’s final, long-awaited assignment as 007 in No Time To Die takes him to the El Nido in Cuba; a fictional bar attached to a beautiful hotel and theatre. Like so many of Bond’s previous visits to luxurious resorts in glamorous locations, this trip is destined to end in bloodshed. Luckily, the explosions and gunshots didn’t upset the Cuban government because Craig and his fellow cast and crew shot the sequence in England, where a whole slice of Latin America had been created at Pinewood Studios, London.
IGN was invited to take a look at this lavish set during the final days of No Time To Die’s shooting schedule back in October 2019, long before the coronavirus pandemic threw the film’s schedule to the seven winds. There, we were able to take a closer look at the designs, props, costumes, and cars used in Daniel Craig’s final James Bond mission. Here’s seven of the most interesting things we learned while on the set of No Time To Die.
1 – Revisiting Madeleine’s Past
No Time To Die will reunite Bond with Léa Seydoux’s Madeleine Swann, the French psychologist he first met during the events of Spectre. She’ll be a key part of No Time To Die’s story, with one scene revisiting her childhood in Norway.
“She’s at a winter home on an ice lake up in Norway, and she is there with her mother,” explained production designer Mark Tildesley. “And then a horrible event takes place which is going to shape her life. Someone comes to pay a visit to her father, who's a great assassin. Obviously he's not there. And something happens. It’s horrible.”
This is a story we’re already familiar with, as Madeleine herself told the tale to Bond in Spectre. She shot and killed the intruder with her father’s pistol, a situation that birthed her hatred of guns. But this time we’re going to see the events unfold on-camera, and finally see the assailant who was seeking her Spectre-operative father, Mr. White.
The Norway house itself will be later revisited by Madeline and Bond, something that meant that the production team had to build three different versions of the house to demonstrate the passage of time. Two of these were soundstage creations, but the one that will be seen in the opening was literally built atop a frozen lake on the orders of director Cary Joji Fukunaga.
2 – Rami Malek’s Masked Assassin
“Our baddie, who is the person that comes to do damage at Madeline's house in the sequence in Norway, is called Segura and he is played by Rami Malek,” Tildesley told us. Take one look at the film’s trailer and you can spot what must be this scene; the disfigured masked assassin is surely Malek at Madeleine’s Norway house on the lake.
This not only means that Madeleine failed to kill her father’s would-be-murderer that night, but also that he’s back in her life for some reason. Quite why he’s back remains unknown, but the fact that Tildesley referred to him as “Segura'', rather than the character’s official name of Safin, suggests maybe there’s a few more twists to come from Malik’s shadowy terrorist.
We already knew that Safin wouldn’t be associated with a religious ideology, but Tidesley revealed that he has a pharmaceutical company background. Would such a prestigious history make Safin a Doctor? No? It’s a tempting fan theory, for sure (one that Fukunaga insists is way off the mark), but it certainly remains to be seen where his loyalties lie. Considering he was in Norway to kill a Spectre agent, it could be that he’s a third party, but we wouldn’t put it past Bond’s greatest enemy to kill their own people.
3 – Bond’s Final Objective
After the events of Spectre, Bond has retired from MI6. But the world of espionage isn’t quite ready to leave him behind. “Felix Leiter comes and asks something of [Bond], just to pick up a package in Cuba,” said veteran 007 producer Michael G. Wilson. “The package turns out to be a person, and Lyshanna [Lynch] – who is playing the British agent – also wants the package, but for the British not the Americas. And so a gun fight erupts.”
It looks like this initial favour to the CIA unfolds into a much larger plot, and Bond is pulled back into a life of danger and disasters once more. This mysterious person-shaped package, who has since been revealed to be a missing scientist named Valdo Obruchev (played by Chernobyl’s David Dencik), will no doubt be the key to No Time To Die’s central plot. They also ensure that Bond will find his way to Cuba, AKA Pinewood Studios.
4 – The El Nido Shootout
From the outside, the set of the El Nido looked like a classic, if unremarkable, Cuban building. Inside, though, things were getting heated. That gunfight that Wilson mentioned had kicked off, and so that could only mean that Bond and Lynch’s 00-agent Nomi had found the package.
On TV monitors linked to the set’s cameras I was able to see Daniel Craig filming take after take of an action sequence involving men with a metal briefcase being janked upwards to the ceiling. Craig had his gun at the ready – clearly that case was in the wrong hands – and he was joined by a glamorous woman with a pistol of her own.
That was Ana de Armas’ Paloma, a CIA agent sent by Leiter to aid Bond in his assignment. Yup, by a stroke of casting genius Craig has been reunited with his Knives Out co-star. But with Bond’s loyalty presumably split between his current and former employers, it’s yet to be seen if he’ll help Paloma see the mission through, or aid MI6’s new 00 agent, Nomi, get her hands on the target.
5 – Vesper’s Shadow
The Craig era of Bond is most notable for its continuing plotline, gradually revealing the many arms of Spectre. But 007’s soul has been continually tormented by that of Vesper Lynd; his Casino Royale lover who turned out to be another tool in Spectre’s arsenal.
No Time To Die will see Bond’s current romantic partner, Madeleine, encourage him to find some kind of closure. “She persuades him that he should go and visit the grave of Vesper as part of his catharsis of moving on with her,” explained Tidesley.
It’s unclear if that catharsis will ever happen, though, especially in the wake of the opening shots of No Time To Die’s first trailer. “Why would I betray you?” asks Madeleine, having seemingly been accused by Bond of following in Vesper’s footsteps. “We all have our secrets,” replies a furious 007.
This revelation brings the ghosts of Bond’s past back to the forefront, said Tidesley. “He is now in a position of turmoil because he is paranoid that another person he dearly loves has betrayed him.”
6 – An Upgraded Aston
That scene from the trailer takes place amongst a larger car chase featuring Bond’s iconic Aston Martin DB5. We see it thundering through the narrow cobbled streets of Matera, Italy, before arriving in a hilltop square.
“In this square he’s captured, he’s t-boned in the side,” revealed No Time To Die’s SFX supervisor, Chris Corbould. “All the exits are shut in by the villains’ cars, and they start pumping full clips of ammunition. Bond is in the car soaking all this up.”
Naturally, Q Branch has ensured that this Aston Martin is well equipped. In fact, it’s had a significant upgrade since its last outing. Rather than Browning .30 calibre machine guns hidden behind the front indicator lights, the entire headlamp segment retracts to reveal rotary mini-guns. It’s the perfect get-out tool.
“[Bond] presses a button, puts it into a donut, and he strafes 360 degrees around the old square," explained Corbould. "We filled the whole square up with smoke which he emits from the exhaust. And that’s how he makes his escape.”
Alongside these impressive new gizmos is a dispenser under the rear bumper that throws out miniature explosives. The license plate has also had an overhaul, with the antiquated revolving plates now replaced with an LCD screen that can display whatever plate Bond needs to remain undercover.
7 – (Slightly) Classic Q Toys
It’s not just the Aston Martin DB5 that’s got some new toys. The final moments of Skyfall indicated that the Craig era was drifting closer to the hallmarks of classic Bond, and that’s more clear than ever in Q Branch’s offerings in No Time To Die. While a tour of Pinewood’s prop warehouse didn’t reveal any exploding pens or laser watches, prop master Ben Wilkinson agreed that there’s a more classic, almost throw-back vibe to the many props being used on No Time To Die.
One of those is Q’s portable laboratory – a sort of mechanic’s workbench as crafted by stealth bomber designers – which contains a tracking array. “He injects Bond and Nomi with a smart blood tracker so he can see what they’re up to and where they’re going,” says Wilkinson. The injection gun itself is built from blue and white plastic and looks like a leftover from the Connery years.
On top of the lab bench is a device which Wilkinson refers to as “Qdar”, which whirrs and oscillates like an old-school gadget, despite looking like a PlayStation peripheral. “That's scanning the surrounding area and beaming information back up to Q,” said Wilkinson. “He can advise them on where they’re going and what they’re doing.”
“But my favorite part of that is his travelling tea set,” he said with a chuckle. He pulled open a drawer of the lab, which is kitted out with a complete, Ritz-quality brew kit. This film’s sense of humour is certainly in the classic mould, then.
We'll see how all these elements fit into the film when No Time To Die releases September 30, 2021 in the UK, and October 8 in the US. For more, read how Bond perfected the 'gritty' reboot.
Matt Purslow is IGN's UK News and Entertainment Writer.