James Bond filmography of the Clint Eastwood character, Dirty Harry — was chosen for Moore to use in "Live and Let Die" rather than Bond's usual choice of Walther PPK. Spicer says "Roger Moore re-created Bond as an old-style debonair hero, more polished and sophisticated than Connery's incarnation, using the mocking insouciance he had perfected in his role as Simon Templar ... Moore's humour was a throwaway, and certainly in the later films, verged on self-parody. It was an essential strand in the increasingly tongue-in-cheek direction of the series which became more light-hearted, knowing and playfully intertextual". Chapman noted that Moore was the
James Bond in film in the Academy Award-winning song "The Windmills of Your Mind"—and was performed by Lani Hall. Fleming's estate, financially backed by Eon Productions and MGM, made a final attempt to block the film in the High Courts in London in the spring of 1983, but this was thrown out by the court and "Never Say Never Again" was permitted to proceed. When "Never Say Never Again" was released, it grossed $9.72 million ($ million in dollars) on its first weekend, which was reported to be "the best opening record of any "James Bond" film" up to that point and surpassing "Octopussy"s