Daniel Craig (Casino Royale, The Adventures of Tintin, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) is ready to put on the tuxedo (and take it off) for the 23rd James Bond film that has a new title, “Skyfall“.
While it’s no great surprise that Craig is back as Bond, anticipation for the latest installment for 007 will grow as director Sam Mendes (American Beauty) made the official announcement in a London press conference Thursday and also said that shooting for Skyfall will begin on location Monday in the British capital at Pinewood Studios and will later move to Istanbul, Turkey Shanghai, China, and Scotland. Mendes was tight-lipped on story specifics and character names to keep wild speculation to a minimum. Mendes did add that if the excitement remains as high after filming as it is now, then he would return to direct another Bond film. Today marks the 50th anniversary of the date that Sean Connery was named Bond for Dr. No making the day of the announcement significant.
Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, and John Logan wrote the screenplay where Bond’s loyalty to his boss M (Dench) is weighed when her past comes back to rear its ugly head. Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson will produce for Sony Pictures who took over as the distributor after Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios (MGM) went bankrupt. Sony will co-finance with MGM for the next two films. Skyfall is set for a release date in Great Britain on October 26, 2012 and the United States on November 9.
Craig will join a marquee that already boasts Javier Bardem (No Country For Old Men) as the villain, Ralph Fiennes (The Harry Potter Saga), Albert Finney (Bourne Ultimatum), Helen McCrory (The Harry Potter Saga), Ben Whishaw (Layer Cake) and Judi Dench (Casino Royale). Bond girls casted are French model Bérénice Marlohe (pictured to the right) and British actress Naomie Harris (Pirates of the Carribbean).
Despite endless rumors about who would play Bond after Craig like Idris Elba, Broccoli and Wilson both expressed a mutual desire to keep Mendes as the Bond helmer for another round, and most importantly Craig as Bond for “the next six years.”
What do you say about that?
