James Bond in film of the funding for the Bond films, fell into financial difficulties following the box office failure of "Heaven's Gate" (1980), bringing uncertainty to the future of the funding. The situation was resolved in May 1981, when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer acquired United Artists. Following "For Your Eyes Only", Roger Moore had expressed a desire to stop playing James Bond. His original contract had been for three films, a requirement fulfilled with "The Spy Who Loved Me". Subsequent films had been negotiated on a film-by-film basis. The producers engaged in a semi-public quest for the next actor to play Bond, which would be for
James Bond, The Spy Who Loved Me is escaping from a cabin on the top of Aiguille du Mort, a mountain near the town of Chamonix. After the mysterious death of Fekkish, SMERSH appears yet again, this time capturing and torturing Bond for the whereabouts of the microfilm that retains plans for a submarine tracking system (Bond escapes after killing two of the interrogators). The revival of SMERSH goes against the latter half of Fleming's Bond novels, in which SMERSH is mentioned to have been put out of operation; however, it is explained within the novel as being Colonel-General Nikitin's doing. Members of SMERSH from the novelization