James Bond, The Spy Who Loved Me James Bond, The Spy Who Loved Me James Bond, The Spy Who Loved Me is the official novelization of the 1977 Eon "James Bond" film "The Spy Who Loved Me", which was itself inspired to the homonimous 1962 novel by Ian Fleming. When Ian Fleming sold the film rights to the James Bond novels to Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli, he only gave permission for the title "The Spy Who Loved Me" to be used. Since the screenplay for the film had nothing to do with Fleming's original novel, Eon Productions, for the first time, authorised that a novelization
James Bond in film Deighton together with Sean Connery to work on a script. The script ran into difficulties after accusations from Eon Productions that the project had gone beyond copyright restrictions, which confined McClory to a film based on the "Thunderball" novel only, and once again the project was deferred. Towards the end of the 1970s developments were reported on the project under the name "James Bond of the Secret Service", but then producer Jack Schwartzman became involved and cleared a number of the legal issues that still surrounded the project and licensed the rights from McClory. With Connery still committed to the