Monday, January 9, 2012

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)





There are few things I enjoy more than spy movies that focus on old world Europe during those grey days of the Cold War. I remember those days well and no novel captures the time and mood of the period like Jean Le Carre's 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy'. My father loved spy books like this. I still have his beaten up old copy in my library.

Based on the classic novel of the same name, the international thriller is set at the height of the Cold War years of the mid-20th Century. George Smiley (Gary Oldman), a disgraced British spy, is rehired in secret by his government - which fears that the British Secret Intelligence Service, a.k.a. MI-6, has been compromised by a double agent working for the Soviets.

It's the little details that I loved here. The antiquated pre-computer way that records were kept and moved. It's no wonder that secrets were the most fleeting of things.

A jazzy blues soundtrack carries everything along.

This is the kind of movie that rewards viewers who pays attention to the little details. I felt like I was in Smiley's mind the whole time that he worked through his investigation. It's a subtle but thrilling performance by Gary Oldman.

The movie respects it's audience enough to resist the urge to over explain everything that is happening on screen. Some may find the style pompous and difficult but I found it riveting. Knowing the story as I did, it was nice to see all the dense details of the book slimmed down. I can, however, see how some would find the story confusing.

With silver hair, thick-rimmed glasses, and a brilliant, analytical mind, his Smiley is as much great detective as he is super-spy – a feeling reinforced by the casting of Benedict Cumberbatch as his Dr Watson, Peter Guillam, and the unseen presence of Karla, his Russian nemesis and Dr Moriarty.

A deliberate, cerebral, grim and utterly absorbing film that makes covert operations appear as unsexy as the Bourne films made them seem fast-paced and thrilling.

8/10

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