This is the definitive Roger Moore Bond film.
The previous entry in the series, "The man with the golden gun", had been affected by the disintegrating relationship between Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli. Broccoli was determined to prove that he could handle the production of the following Bond films on his own and everyone around him was up for the challenge.
There is a real sense of confidence and enthusiasm to "The spy who loved me". Roger Moore gives his smoothest performance as Bond. Lewis Gilbert's direction is full of creative energy, Barbara Bach is one of the most beautiful of all the Bond girls and the overall production is magnificent.
There are many classic scenes here that linger in the mind long after the film ends: Bond's eerie stalking of Jaws around the pyramids, the ravishingly shot romantic interlude on the Nile, Stromberg's underwater base rising up out of the ocean, and, best of all, Bond skling off Mount Asgard and opening a Union Jack parachute.
This is a very classy film indeed. The humour, as is often the case with this era of Bond, gets a little silly at times, but, on the whole, the film works wonderfully.
Claude Renoir's lovely cinematography makes this probably the most beautiful-looking of all the Bond films.