Roger Moore, Barbara Bach, Curd Jürgens

When a massive underwater craft abducts U.S. and Russian submarines, global tensions are heightened to the brink of war. In order to find the true culprit, James Bond (Agent 007) joins forces with bea...( read more  read more... )utiful Russian agent Anya Amasova. Together they follow a trail that leads to Karl Stromberg, a powerful shipping magnate who is implementing a horrific scheme for world domination. Bond struggles to foil the plot, but Stromberg has provided him with a most lethal adversary: Jaws, a seemingly indestructible steel-toothed giant. Agent 007's adventure takes him to the Egyptian pyramids, under the sea and to a mountaintop ski chase.

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72% liked it

23,426 ratings

Critics

78% liked it

37 critics

PG, 2 hrs. 5 min.

Directed by: Lewis Gilbert

Release Date: July 13, 1977

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DVD Release Date: October 22, 2002

Stats: 1,847 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (1,847)


  • September 23, 2009
    I think it?s safe to say that this is one of the best Bond films, it?s certainly one of my favourite Bond films! The end sequence is brilliant!
  • January 1, 2009
    One of the best for Moore. Introduces Jaws and gives him a female Russian counterpart alternately sleeping w/ him and then wanting to kill him. What more could a spy ask for?
  • December 22, 2008
    So this one has another ski chase scene early on like OHMSS. It is not as drawn out, but the zigzagging path Bond takes is more exciting in some ways and it is shot better. It ends with the first instance of Bond taking a leap off a huge cliff and releasing a British flag parac...( read more)hute. The opening credits feature a lot of jumping on trampolines and silhouetted naked women doing gymnastics with a kind of lame Carly Simon pop song for the theme. We find that the Russians will be involved in the plot of this Bond pic, but with an interesting twist. We are given a surprise when we first meet Russian Agent XXX, or Major Amasova. Barbara Bach, in the role of Anya Amasova, was absolutely beautiful and smart and strong. She and Bond are competing to retrieve the same intelligence and eventually start working together (the cold war is ending as the British and KGB begin Anglo-Soviet cooperation) on the mystery of what has been happening to several missing atomic subs. Well the movie Jaws had just come out a couple years before, and while this wasn't the first Bond film to include quite a bit of underwater action, the fact that a couple characters have to wrestle with the villain's shark and this pic includes a scene on a beach where the sub-car emerges from the water amongst many onlookers, suggests it was influenced by that other blockbuster. The plot involves a villain who is more comfortable among the fishes and plans to use nuclear submarines to destroy most life on earth and instead create underwater cities for his chosen supporters. The villain, Stromberg, has webbed hands, has at his disposal several ways to dispose of people he does not trust or like, and is fairly cutting edge with his surveillance system, monitors, and loud speaker system, but not particularly memorable as a character. His lair, Atlantis, as again designed by Ken Adam, might be my favorite Bond villain lair. This movie has the first appearance of one of the most memorable henchmen too, Jaws. Yes, Bond has to come to Anya's rescue when Jaws surprises them in the train, but I really don't think this movie has as much male chauvinism as some of the others. Agent XXX is able to handle herself, except Jaws is an indestructible giant, and Bond himself is just barely able to overtake him with some creative tech assistance. The locations are again exotic. The director, Gilbert, returning for his second Bond film brings a lot of humor and fantasy, which I like, to this picture. And it seems that he works very well with Roger Moore. I really liked the relationship between Bond and Amasova, the portable microfilm reader, a couple of the other things Q was developing, and the set design. The big gun and grenade battle near the end with Bond breaking British, American, and Russian sub crews (in blue and white shirts) out of holding cells in Stromberg's super-tanker to fight Stromberg's men (in red shirts) was too much explosion for me. I prefer the Bond who goes it alone or with just one or two colleagues, the witty Bond, the clever Bond who finds creative means to bring down the enemy. For the most part, this 10th film in the series fulfills those things.
  • November 29, 2008
    The Spy Who Loved Me opens with something happening to a British submarine. What happens we don't know, but we soon find out that the same thing has happened to a Soviet sub at around the same time. What's the world to do? James Bond (Roger Moore) must join forces with the beauti...( read more)ful Russian agent XXX (Barbara Bach) to find out what happened to the subs and who holds the technology to find them underwater.

    The Spy Who Loved is not only the best Bond film from the Moore era, it also ranks up there as one of the best of the series. After the previous two lackluster Bond films (The Man with the Golden Gun caused Harry Saltzburg to sell out his half to UA) the series goes all out with over the top gadgets and villains with super cool hideouts. I wouldn't rate Stromberg (Curt Jergens) on the same page as Goldfinger, but he is an interesting villain unlike the one that followed him.

    This film is a great Bond romp and even though it screams the '70's with it's disco soundtrack and numerous ascots it stands as a return to form that the series had not seen since Connery held the number 007.
  • November 17, 2008
    Roger Moore has always maintained that The Spy Who Loved Me is the best of his Bond films. Personally I prefer Octopussy and For Your Eyes Only, but this one certainly has its moments. The original novel by Ian Fleming was an odd-one-out in the book series, describing as it did h...( read more)ow an off-duty Bond saved a female hotelier from a couple of nasty hoodlums. However, in this film adaptation the novel has been completely jettisoned and replaced with a story about Bond thwarting a megalomaniac from achieving world domination.

    Bond (Moore) is partnered with Russian agent Anya Amasova (Barbara Bach - most beautiful of all the many Bond girls) to solve the mysterious disappearance of two nuclear submarines, one British the other Russian. They follow the clues to the underwater lair of Karl Stromberg (Curt Jurgens), an elegant and educated psychopath with a plan to destroy the world in a nuclear holocaust and retreat to his undersea empire. To add to their complications, Anya learns that her recently killed boyfriend was eliminated by Bond during an assignment.

    The pre-credit sequence is among the better pre-credit sequences in the series, involving an extraordinary ski stunt which many consider to be the most breathtaking stunt ever devised for a Bond film. Moore is good as Bond, Bach stunningly attractive as his partner (though not very convincing as an actress), and Jurgens provides a suitably over-confident villain. The location work in various locations, most notably Egypt, is nicely photographed. Marvin Hamlisch provides the music, marking a change from the usual composer John Barry, and Hamlisch's score is decent enough though it does have a dated '70s quality to it when listened to nowadays. The plot is totally implausible and self-parodic (if they'd stuck to the plot in the book though, it would've been almost impossible to make a Bond movie in the expected sense of the phrase), but director Lewis Gilbert cleverly plays it with tongue-in-cheek so that the absurdness of the on-screen events becomes curiously endearing. The Spy Who Loved Me is silly, entertaining and extravagantly spectacular.
  • November 1, 2009
    At last I have seen this on tele.This was entertaining.It wasn't as good as Casino Royale and The man with the golden gun but it still delivered some great acting performances and it delivers a great story.
    Some great action but in this James Bond there wasn't any police chases ...( read more)which was a shame but this James Bond was more different and more original so thats good.
    Maybe they should of kept all the police chases in there but the story was still great and very Interesting but too many explosions it got to parts when the story faded and it became all these bombs and explosions and more.
    Other than that the fights and the story overall was great that should keep its bond audience entertained.
    Overall this was good that was well delivered some great Acting with a well delivered story I did perfer the begining to the end but it was all good really.
  • November 1, 2009
    well umn just seen this movie 4 the 1st time n think that this is a good movie 2 watch....its got a good cast of actors/actressess throughout this movie...i think that roger moore, barbara bach, curd jurgens, richard kiel, caroline munro, walter gotell, geoffrey keen, bernard lee...( read more), george baker play good roles/parts throughout this movie....i think that roger moore was good as james bond in this movie....i think that the director of this adventure/action/thriller/spy movie had done a good job of directing this movie because you never know what 2 expect thorughout this movie...i think that this is a good james bond movie 2 watch its got a good cast throughout this movie...its an enjoyable movie 2 watch its a good movie 2 watch...i think that the fight scenes n the gun shoot outs were good thorughout this movie
  • October 29, 2009
    Never really followed the storyline, but it entertains anyway!
  • October 25, 2009
    there getting better totatlly loved the little pod thing at the end and hte car
  • August 24, 2009
    pretty good movie. Roger just isn't Sean!

Comments


  • Cuish
    April 24, 2008
    Two words: Star Wars
  • darthmetalhead1
    January 26, 2008
    Why at the end of the credits did they Say James Bond will Return in For Your Eyes Only when Moonraker was next?

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The Spy Who Loved Me Trivia


  • Which movie is the odd one out?  Answer »
  • Which movie has this tagline : " It's the BIGGEST. It's the BEST. It's Bond and B-E-Y-O-N-D "  Answer »
  • Which James Bond title track does not have the same name as the movie it appears in?  Answer »
  • What movie is this? Both the British and Russians are amazed when a submarine from each country disappears and the only link is a microfilm detailing the movements of the British submarine meaning that somehow a submarine can be tracked via it's "wake".   Answer »

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