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This article contains spoilers for No Time To Die
A few weeks ago, before No Time To Die finally reached cinemas, we asked director Cary Joji Fukunaga how many jokes he’d had to endure about the film’s title.
"So many," was the somewhat exhausted answer. "There’s a lot of jokes you can make about the 'no time' thing, it’s an endless supply."
The punchline, you see, is that James Bond actually had plenty of time to die. Far too much time to die, in all honesty. Daniel Craig’s final outing as 007 was supposed to arrive in November 2019, but a succession of pandemic-related postponements meant that it was shelved for almost two years.
It must have been particularly annoying for Fukunaga, because it turns out that the title was crafted as a bit of an in-joke in the first place. A misnomer and a knowing wink. At the end of No Time To Die, Bond *SECOND MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT* succumbs to a blaze of rocket fire. Then, following some sombre scenes, the movie is played out to Louis Armstrong’s ‘We Have All the Time in the World’ as the credits roll.
It’s an important song in Bond lore, and one that the character references at the beginning of the new film. While driving around Matera, Italy, an uncharacteristically carefree 007 tells his partner Madeleine (Léa Seydoux) that “we have all the time in the world”, while an orchestral rendition of the track swells around them.
The scene, and the song, is a reference to a Bond classic that also deviated from standard proceedings: 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service starring George Lazenby in his first and only performance as the British spy.
It was long-time Bond composer John Barry who decided that it would be too awkward to cram ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’ into a chorus, and so chose to compose a love song for the Bond theme instead. Burt Bacharach lyricist Hal David helped with the words to ‘We Have All the Time in the World’, while Louis Armstrong, who was very ill at the time, was enlisted to sing on the track.
The jazz legend was chosen because Barry thought he could “deliver the title line with irony” – important, considering that Bond’s one and only wife in the series, Contessa Teresa "Tracy" di Vicenzo, dies at the end of the film, cradled in his arms.
And so when the callback arrived at the start of No Time To Die, the suggestion was clear: Madeleine Swann, the woman James Bond was about to commit his life to, would ultimately die. As it turned out, that was a bait and switch. As the finale falls, Bond willingly perishes after learning that Safin has infected him with a virus that would kill Madeleine and their five-year-old daughter, Mathilde, upon contact.
It's fitting that Craig's last adventure would pay tribute to the fans that have stuck with the series for decades, as well as younger viewers that have delved into its back catalogue, while still managing to spring a surprise on them. Now to see what comes next.
