That lovable British star Roger Moore, who ascended to movie Valhalla with seven James Bond films between 1973 and 1985, gets the indulgent, affectionate treatment he deserves in this documentary celebration, featuring interviews with Christopher Walken, Pierce Brosnan, 007 superfan David Walliams, franchise producers Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, his children Geoffrey (an eerie echo of his dad), Deborah and Christian, and of course Joan Collins who is almost Roger’s female equivalent in arch self-deprecating wit. Steve Coogan impersonates the Moore narrative voiceover, mostly reading from his garrulous memoir The 007 Diaries: Filming Live and Let Die, which in a less corporately controlled age Moore was allowed to bring out in 1973 as a tie-in.
This is a very enjoyable watch for Moore devotees, though the long stretch of home videos towards the end might test your patience a little bit. The film shrewdly shows how Roger really did invent himself, a lifelong method acting project constructing an unvarying dapper persona which did not change in TV interviews (though invariably accessorised by a large, louche cigar).
His personal story is also rather amazing: his first marriage to ice-skater Doorn Van Steyn made him, at 18 years old, a caring stepdad to a little boy; his second marriage to the larger-than-life singer and vexatious litigant Dorothy Squires helped him make invaluable showbiz connections; it had a tinge of tragicomedy when Squires refused him a divorce for years after he left her for Italian star Luisa Mattioli who was in turn chagrined when Roger later married her friend Kristina Tholstrup.
Mattioli has the film’s most outrageous anecdote: when she and Roger were in a restaurant, a young woman in purple hot pants walked past and Luisa promptly slapped Roger’s cherubic face; when he woundedly asked what that was for she replied: “Just in case.”
I very much enjoyed this film, despite two important omissions: there’s no mention of Roger Moore’s turn in Basil Dearden’s 1970 thriller The Man Who Haunted Himself, a genuinely excellent performance. And it fails to mention the hilarious scene, about which Moore was himself later cheerfully embarrassed, in which Bond callously pushes a small child into the water in The Man With the Golden Gun. Not great behaviour for a future Unicef ambassador.
• From Roger Moore With Love is in UK cinemas from 13 December.
