Tinker, Tailor, Soldier...Fine
I have always loved spy novels. Cold War novels by John le Carre and Len Deighton. The stories about the Enigma cipher (WWII). Ken Follett wrote some good ones before he fell into historical triumph with Pillars of the Earth. The James Bond books were not so cartoonish as the films, but they weren't of this same gritty, realistic ilk. Most of the these I'm referring to weren't made into successful single films because they were too complex for a two-hour adaptation. BBC did a wonderful miniseries version of John le Carre's Smiley's People, one of the best of the genre. But films??
Now here comes Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, a 2011 sleeper that, from the look of the theater today, no one has heard about. You might have seen a mention in the Oscar nominations for Gary Oldman (yes, Sirius Black! and many other wonderful portrayals). And well deserved!
Oldman plays George Smiley, the aging MI-5 operative, put out to pasture after a disastrous operation gets an operative killed, and brings down his mentor Control, the head of "the Circus" as the spy agency is called here. But a young agent has gotten wind of a rumor that could bring down the increasingly marginalized agency. Someone in the inner circle is a mole - a tool of the Russian spymaster known as Karla.
The file evokes the gritty (yes that word again) shadowy world of the 70s cold war. Hot wars were fought through surrogates, but the cold war was fought on the wet streets of East Berlin and Paris...and Budapest...and in the concrete block offices of London, each side hunting for intelligence - the kind that could only come through defectors or agents in place. Dangerous business. No flashy car chases. And in those days, no dazzling sensors or cell phones or laser beams or Mission Impossible impossibilities.
Oldman's performance is beautifully nuanced. He is a taciturn man. Serious, intellectual, but hopelessly enamored of a wife who is unfaithful. Hearing the reliable report of a mole--a double agent--in the highest echelon of his kingdom's secret service--men he has worked with--grieves him, yet he never says a word to convey it. A masterful performance. And the film spins back and forth in time and place, yet never needs labels to tell us when we are looking at a Christmas party in happier times for the agency or when we are in Budapest watching the fateful meeting and murder or when we are seeing the patient, dogged George unraveling a case for the ages. No being lowered from the roof, no pressure sensors, no leaps, just good work, and a great story. Loved it.
Now here comes Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, a 2011 sleeper that, from the look of the theater today, no one has heard about. You might have seen a mention in the Oscar nominations for Gary Oldman (yes, Sirius Black! and many other wonderful portrayals). And well deserved!
Oldman plays George Smiley, the aging MI-5 operative, put out to pasture after a disastrous operation gets an operative killed, and brings down his mentor Control, the head of "the Circus" as the spy agency is called here. But a young agent has gotten wind of a rumor that could bring down the increasingly marginalized agency. Someone in the inner circle is a mole - a tool of the Russian spymaster known as Karla.
The file evokes the gritty (yes that word again) shadowy world of the 70s cold war. Hot wars were fought through surrogates, but the cold war was fought on the wet streets of East Berlin and Paris...and Budapest...and in the concrete block offices of London, each side hunting for intelligence - the kind that could only come through defectors or agents in place. Dangerous business. No flashy car chases. And in those days, no dazzling sensors or cell phones or laser beams or Mission Impossible impossibilities.
Oldman's performance is beautifully nuanced. He is a taciturn man. Serious, intellectual, but hopelessly enamored of a wife who is unfaithful. Hearing the reliable report of a mole--a double agent--in the highest echelon of his kingdom's secret service--men he has worked with--grieves him, yet he never says a word to convey it. A masterful performance. And the film spins back and forth in time and place, yet never needs labels to tell us when we are looking at a Christmas party in happier times for the agency or when we are in Budapest watching the fateful meeting and murder or when we are seeing the patient, dogged George unraveling a case for the ages. No being lowered from the roof, no pressure sensors, no leaps, just good work, and a great story. Loved it.
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Melinda
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Jan 27, 2012 02:09PM
I thought this movie was an instant classic. I'd watch it again in a heartbeat.
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The fine, interconnecting threads of people strung out on danger were just beautiful to watch.
Much more edge-of-the-seat than "blah, blah, rappelling down a cliff/the side of a building, blah, blah, car chase, blah blah, sex scene, blah blah, stealing a file, blah blah, I'm gonna shoot/cut your throat." The fact that LeCarre's books are still selling at full price, even on Amazon, and the Kindle version is almost as expensive as the paperback despite the datedness of his storylines, is testament to Le Carre's genius. Huge hat tip to the filmmakers who were bold enough to preserve the story, trusting enough of the audience, and talented enough to keep us on the edges of our seats for over two hours while we watched guys sitting around talking and going in and out of buildings. The true coldness of the Cold War perfectly portrayed. Gary Oldman is as deserving of every possible award, as was Colin Firth last year (for different reasons, of course), but sadly and too often, hysterical performances win out over human ones. (not a reference to Firth--I'm thinking more Halle Berry winning for Monster's Ball when Sissy Spacek should have won for In the Bedroom, and Julia Roberts being herself in Erin Brockovich and still beating the much-more-deserving Laura Linney's subtle performance in You Can Count on Me).
Yes, yes, on the boldness of the filmmakers preserving the story. Exactly what I thought about the shifting back and forth seamlessly between times. You could see in the FACES when the time had shifted.
