The Spy Who Loved Me - Opening Ski Jump
The Setup: Two submarines with nuclear weapons - one British, one Russian - have been stolen. Russia and Britain need to find out what happened, fast. Russia has already sent their agent, Triple X, to report to Moscow. The agent, Anya Amasova, was spending a romantic weekend with her partner when she gets word to leave. Her partner also has his own mission - which, it turns out, is to eliminate James Bond.
Reason(s) why I love it: The Spy Who Loved Me is the first James Bond film I saw. Like many people, they tend to gravitate towards 'their' James Bond, the actor who played the character when they started watching the films. I fully admit that Roger Moore is 'my' James Bond, and this film is my favorite of all of the James Bond films. This film might not be the 'best' James Bond film in terms of being purely analytical. But for me, like Carly Simon sings in the title song, 'nobody does it better' than Sir Roger Moore.
Now, I can understand why some people who rank Bond films and actors who play James Bond may put Roger Moore's films lower on their list. Some of the worst James Bond films are Roger's. But at the same time, this film should - and does - rank very highly on many James Bond lists. And this opening scene, as well as the accompanying title song, are big reasons why this film is so great. There is still humor (Bond getting his usual witticism while kissing a lady), but the action is what drives this clip. The background music during the ski chase is very 1970s (the score is even called 'Bond '77), but I happen to still think it's cool. And the revelation that Bond killed Anya's lover (which you should watch the film to see the scene before this one) becomes a serious plot point during the film. And that ski jump... it's still an amazing stunt. Finally, there's the theme song, and it's easily one of the best Bond theme songs.