Hollywood continues to make adjustments as the film and entertainment industry strives to make the most of the new normal emerging because of the global coronavirus pandemic. The most recent adjustment made is with the latest James Bond film, No Time To Die, which has seen its release date moved up.
Variety reports that the film will now premiere in the United States on Nov. 20. This is the second time the film’s North American release date has been adjusted, as it was originally set to premiere on Apr. 10. However, the global coronavirus pandemic forced the studio to move it to Nov. 25 before finally settling on the recently-announced Nov. 20 date.
The move sets up a clash between No Time To Die and Pixar’s Soul, which itself was moved from its premiere this month to Nov. 20. Soul’s move to November also necessitated the rescheduling of another Pixar film, Raya and the Last Dragon, which will now premiere on Mar. 12, 2021.
NME reveals that the new Bond film will be set five years after the events of Spectre and will feature Daniel Craig as James Bond for the last time. In the movie, Bond has already retired from espionage and is enjoying his free time in Jamaica.
NME reports that No Time To Die director Cary Joji Fukunaga wanted to explore what Bond would be like five years after retirement. He says he wanted to introduce a Bond confused with how things work now and a darker world of espionage that Bond will be unfamiliar with.
Fukunaga also revealed that Bond’s adversary in No Time To Die is stronger, smarter, and more dangerous than anybody else he has faced before. The director also promised that the movie would be “a race to save the world and their lives.”
The No Time To Die premiere adjustment is just the latest in a long string of reschedulings Hollywood has had to do to adjust to the global coronavirus pandemic. Aside from No Time To Die, Soul, and Raya and the Last Dragon, other films that have had to be rescheduled include Mulan, Black Widow, The Eternals, In the Heights, Wonder Woman 1984, Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Morbius, F9, and Top Gun: Maverick.
A successful James Bond film would mean a lot in reversing the economic damage wrought by the global coronavirus pandemic on the film industry. Back in March, the North American film industry suffered a $600 million deficit because of closed movie theaters. The global film industry is itself expected to suffer a loss of $5 billion because large markets like South Korea and Japan have closed.