Bringing a daunting set of qualities to the story is the villain Safin, played by Academy Award-winner Rami Malek. A number of Bond’s recent adversaries have displayed a personal connection to the hero; Fukunaga was fascinated by the idea and has linked Safin’s backstory with Madeleine’s.
“Safin’s backstory is so tied to Madeleine’s,” affirms the director, “and there’s a mirror between him and Bond. Here is somebody that sees himself not as a villain in her life, but as a hero. It was great fun to see an actor with Rami’s talent and an actress as accomplished as Léa go head to head in a very complex and frightening way.”
Malek, meanwhile, wanted his villain, “To bring everything he possibly could in order to give Bond the hardest time possible.” Safin is brutal. “Ultimately, I think he sees that as being a product of a ruthlessness he faced as a child,” adds the actor. “This is something that has been instilled in him from a young age.”
“He’s a product of an innocence that was lost very early in his life, and so he has difficulty in justifying what is right and wrong. From Bond’s perspective, there is a very clear understanding of what is right and wrong. But Safin has a way of making you consider if that is actually as accurate as it seems to be.”
A complex hero like Bond requires a complex enemy. “I think with every villain, we as actors always try to humanize them,” continues Malek. “I think that makes them more relatable. Obviously, sometimes you don’t want the villain to be relatable. Sometimes you want them to be pure evil and to strike fear in the audience.”
“But there’s something about empathizing with a character like this that is very unsettling. And what I really wanted from Safin was to make him unsettling. Even when I see him in the trailer, I find that to be one of the traits that stands out for me.”
Malek is a top-notch performer and he reminded me more of those old classic Bond villains.
We spoke out that, but I couldn’t let him go without speaking about how much I love Mr. Robot which is one of the greatest TV shows of all time in my opinion.
You can watch our whole interview below. No Time to Die will be released in the US on October 8th, 2021.