The Spy Who Loved Me (film) big budget was not wasted. Interestingly, while the sets and gimmicks were the most spectacular to date, Bond and the other characters are toned down (there's a minimum of slapstick humour) so that they are more realistic than in other Roger Moore films. Moore gives his best performance in the series ... [Bond and Anya Amasova] are an appealing couple, equal in every way. Film is a real treat – a well acted, smartly cast, sexy, visually impressive, lavishly produced, powerfully directed mix of a spy romance and a war-mission film." Janet Maslin of "The New York Times" considered the
The Spy Who Loved Me (soundtrack) Chopin crops up later, when Bond first meets Stromberg, as reportedly does an excerpt from Saint-Saëns' "The Aquarium" from "The Carnival of the Animals". Finally, Hamlisch cheekily segues his score into an excerpt from that of David Lean's 1962 film "Lawrence of Arabia" when Bond and Anya Amasova are wandering through the desert; according to a documentary on the DVD, this idea was originally a joke by one of the film editors who played the music over the dailies of the scene. It became a trend, with the subsequent two films in the series similarly referencing 'classic' film music within