Danny Boyle, the auteur behind films such as Trainspotting and 28 Days Later, has opened up about his James Bond movie that never got made. Speaking with Esquire UK, the director revealed the plot of the spy movie, and how his time working on the scrapped feature truly put his career choices into perspective.
In 2018, Boyle was set to helm the 25th James Bond movie with his screenwriting partner John Hodge. However, the Oscar winner left the project due to creative differences with producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson. No Time To Die would go on to replace the filmmaker’s Bond attempt, which has remained mysterious up until now. After three years, Boyle has now opened up on what his scrapped Bond film would have been about, and, ultimately, why the experience turned him off big franchises.
“Weirdly—it would have been very topical now—it was all set in Russia, which is, of course, where Bond came from, out of the Cold War,” Boyle shared. “It was set in present-day Russia and went back to his origins, and they just lost, what’s the word… they just lost confidence in it. It was a shame really.”
When asked if he would ever take another crack at a big IP such as James Bond again, Doyle revealed that it would be unlikely. “I don’t think so,” he said. “I learned my lesson that I am not cut out [for franchises]; otherwise, you’re digging in the same hole.”
“I am better not quite in the mainstream franchise movies, is the honest answer,” he continued. “I learned quite a lot about myself with Bond, I work in partnerships with writers, and I am not prepared to break it up.”
Despite leaving agent 007 behind for now, Boyle has been keeping busy. The filmmaker has just finished work on the TV series Pistol which will release on Disney Plus come May 31. He has also begun pre-production on the adventure movie Methuselah, which has Michael B Jordan starring in a leading role.