The Arc cinema in Hucknall is holding a James Bond themed evening, complete with casino and drinks followed by a midnight screening of the latest instalment of the franchise, No Time to Die.

The film was initially scheduled to debut in cinemas in March 2020, just two weeks after the Hucknall cinema was originally intending to open its doors for the first time. However, the Coronavirus pandemic saw both occasions postponed.

The cinema had a turbulent start, managing to open in June last year showing old films before being forced to shut again for six months at the end of October. It then finally opened, showing new films for the first time, from May this year with strict social distancing rules. You can read about this tumultuous time here .

No Time to Die has been pushed back a further three times but will finally come to the big screen on Thursday 30 September.

In celebration of this, The Arc are holding an evening entitled 'Byron Royale' from 10:30pm on Wednesday 29 September. The cinema has linked up with a local casino equipment hire company and will have three tables of casino games including blackjack and roulette.

Each customer will be given pretend money to gamble with. There will be a free bottle of champagne to the person who has the most 'Arc Cinema dollars' at the end. This will be followed, at one minute past midnight, by the first showing of the film itself in two screens of the cinema.

Tickets for this event are priced at £16.75 each and go on sale at the cinema and online at 7:30am on Monday (13 September).

Speaking exclusively to Hucknall Nub News, Cinema manager Mark Gallagher said: "We've not really done an event. We've not had a midnight screening yet. We absolutely wanted to do a midnight screening.

"Customers can arrive from 10:30, they'll have an hour and a half to gamble with pretend money. We're hoping to have some cocktails on offer some Martinis shaken obviously. Then we'll have two screens showing the film at one minute past midnight.

"I'd love to fill two screens. The film will finish at about two in the morning. Hopefully it's a really cool night. I want to make it really fun, something to remember. We're going to encourage everyone to dress up in tuxes, black tie, dresses and all that.

"Since we've been open, it is the number one film that customers are asking about. Hucknall, and I think the whole world, are just gagging to see this film.

"From a cinema industry point of view, everyone's looking at it as a bit of a litmus test for cinema coming back. Box office in this country and most of the world, America and here, is at 50% of what it should be at the minute. We're still nowhere near being pre-Covid times.

"And so we're hoping the new James Bond film will kickstart everything, and from here until Christmas there's loads of films due for release. There's a lot of pressure on Bond to perform because if it doesn't perform it's possible that a lot of the studios will look at it and pull their films until next year."

The week before this there will be more Bond themed fun to whet people's appetite with a pub quiz all about 007 run by the Arc Cinema at the Station Hotel.

This will be held on Thursday 23 September at 8:00pm. Questions are described as easy to medium in terms of difficulty.

Mr Gallagher will be writing the quiz, something he had a lot of practice at during lockdown when he hosted a weekly film quiz on Youtube when the cinema wasn't allowed to open.

Of this quiz, he said: "We're going to give away a £50 voucher as the main prize, I'm going to give away a couple of tickets to the Casino midnight event, the pub is also going to put up some beer related prizes, there'll be some cash and some Bond merch to giveaway so it's going to be really fun."

Booking a table at The Station Hotel in advance is recommended to avoid disappointment.

If you would like information on the cinema visit their website here . For a detailed breakdown of this week's film times, see here .