JAMES BOND – NO TIME TO DIE!
It is the most highly anticipated movie in years: On the same day of the world premiere in London, the 17th Zurich Film Festival will show the new James Bond movie NO TIME TO DIE. The Swiss premiere is set to take place on Tuesday, September 28 – two days before its official theatrical release – at the Zurich Convention Center. A retrospective of Daniel Craig’s Bond movies accompanies one of the most sensational premieres in ZFF history.
It’s about time: the lengthy wait for Cary Joji Fukunaga’s NO TIME TO DIE is finally over. The new James Bond movie will celebrate its Swiss premiere screening at the ZFF. Fans in Switzerland will get to see the most highly anticipated movie of the year just shortly after it is launched in London, the home city of the Double O Agent.
“We are extremely pleased to be one of the first in the world to show our audience the most recent Bond adventure,” says Christian Jungen, Artistic Director of the ZFF. “We fought for months to get this premiere and had to negotiate every last detail with the distribution company Universal. Never before has James Bond been in the official selection of a film festival. I am further pleased that the ZFF has succeeded in this coup as it sends out a powerful signal that highlights the importance of cinema. The industry has waited more eagerly for this movie than any other.”
Bond’s remarkable popularity among moviegoers in Switzerland is down to the fact that he has had more adventures here with us than almost anywhere else. James Bond’s connection with Switzerland stretches back to the very first film, when the Swiss actress Ursula Andress played Bond woman Honey Rider in the 1962 movie DR. NO. Bond’s creator, Ian Fleming, is said to have been so impressed by Andress that he made Bond’s mother Swiss in his next novel, thus making James Bond half Swiss. The premiere is Bond’s most recent tie to Switzerland.
“Year after year, the ZFF brings the glamour of Hollywood to Zurich and is a feast for all film lovers,” says Emin Soysaler, Managing Director of film distributor Universal. “In hardly any other country does the James Bond series stand for great cinema more than in this country, and traditionally Switzerland is thus one of the most important markets worldwide for the 007 adventures. Due to the pandemic, the theatrical release had to be postponed and now we are even more pleased to be able to present NO TIME TO DIE to the Swiss audience at this year’s Zurich Film Festival. The wait has been worth it: Bond is back!”
NO TIME TO DIE, an EON Productions and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios film
Credit: Nicola Dove © 2021 DANJAQ, LLC AND MGM. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
NO TIME TO DIE by the American director Cary Joji Fukunaga (TRUE DETECTIVE) is the 25th movie in the James Bond franchise. As well as being the fifth and last time Daniel Craig plays the title role, it also marks a debut moment for FLEABAG-Star Phoebe Waller-Bridge as the movie’s co-writer. This much can be revealed about the as always highly secret plot: James Bond has just retired to Jamaica when he is approached by his old friend Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright). Enlisted to rescue a kidnapped scientist, 007 must now track down the villainous Safin.
Safin is played by Rami Malek, who won an Oscar for his role as Freddy Mercury in BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY. Although Malek replaces Christoph Waltz as Bond’s arch-enemy, Waltz still makes an appearance in the new film. Other familiar faces include Léa Seydoux, who returns as Madeleine Swann, Ralph Fiennes, who embodies Bond’s superior M, Ben Whishaw as the tinkerer Q and Naomie Harris as the secretary Eve Moneypenny.
The Swiss premiere of NO TIME TO DIE takes place at 9 pm on Tuesday, September 28 at the Zurich Convention Center. The ZFF shows a second screening of the movie on Saturday October 2, also at the Zurich Convention Center, the ZFF’s new 1200-seat screening venue – making it Switzerland’s largest Bond screening. A retrospective of Daniel Craig’s four previous appearances as Bond, and the new documentary “Being James Bond”, complements one of the most sensational premieres in ZFF history.
Universal Pictures International Switzerland will release NO TIME TO DIE in Swiss cinemas two days after the premiere at ZFF, on 30 September 2021.
The complete program of the 17th Zurich Film Festival will be published on the website on Thursday, September 9, from 12 noon local time. In addition, it can be viewed on the official festival app Tribo, where it is also possible to compile a personal festival program. Ticket sales will start on Monday, September 13, from 12 noon local time.
