Review of The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) by Jonathan B — 14 May 2011

This is probably the best of the Roger Moore James Bond movies. It manages to maintain a suave, sophisticated air while keeping it's tongue firmly in it's cheek.

The plot is an aquatic ripoff of You Only Live Twice with nuclear submarines being swallowed up by a marauding super tanker controlled by a web-fingered nuttier with designs on world domination.

Barbara Bach plays the obligatory love interest as agent Triple X. A Russian agent who teams up with our smirking hero in order to find out what the heck is going on. She more than manages to keep up with the double entendres and chucks in a couple of corkers herself.

Of course, this was the movie with THAT car. The one that turns into a submarine. The publicity men at Lotus must have wet themselves with excitement when they found out what was planned. The car, whether being pursued along Sardinian roads by a helicopter or paddling through the Med towards the baddies lair still looks great and the accompanying funky score keeps you tapping your toes to the beat.

Lewis Gilbert milks every exotic angle out of the locations that he can possible get away with and also manages to pack in some great action sequences on the massive, purpose built stage at Pinewood.

Chief baddie, Stromburg, played by Curd JÃ 1/4rgens perhaps lacks the menace of some of the other Bond villains but he does employ Richard Kiel in the form of Jaws as one of the most memorable henchmen of the franchise. Caroline Munro also makes the most of her small role as the bikini-clad Stromburg side-kick, Naomi.

For me, after this movie, the Moore Bond went into something of a decline but he was the perfect spy for the 1970s. Beige-clad, sexiest and kissing like a shop mannequin, no doubt he reeked of Tabac as the smugness oozed out of his every pore.

A wonderful bit of escapist fun.