Known As:
Шпион, выйди вон!

StoryLine:
In the early 1970s during the Cold War, the head of British Intelligence, Control, resigns after an operation in Budapest, Hungary goes badly wrong. It transpires that Control believed one of four senior figures in the service was in fact a Russian agent - a mole - and the Hungary operation was an attempt to identify which of them it was. Smiley had been forced into retirement by the departure of Control, but is asked by a senior government figure to investigate a story told to him by a rogue agent, Ricky Tarr, that there was a mole. Smiley considers that the failure of the Hungary operation and the continuing success of Operation Witchcraft (an apparent source of significant Soviet intelligence) confirms this, and takes up the task of finding him. Through the efforts of Peter Guillam, Smiley obtains information that eventually leads him to Jim Prideaux, the agent at the heart of the Hungary fiasco...

Cast & Director:
Colin Firth, Gary Oldman, Tom Hardy, Tomas Alfredson

Keywords: Mole | Spying | British Secret Intelligence Service | Istanbul Turkey | British Spy |

Genres: Thriller

Goofs & Mistakes:Factual errors: A speed hump can be seen on the road. These certainly did not exist in 1973.

Quotes: [from trailer]George Smiley:[to Karla]We are not so very different, you and I. We've both spent our lives looking for the weaknesses in one another.

Taglines: The enemy is within.

Not everyone can be one of Smiley's people.

It is true to say that Smiley is no Bourne nor Bond but Tinker TailorSoldier Spy is a beautifully played and observed spy film. Should youexpect car chases, spills, thrills, gadgets galore andclosely-choreographed fight scenes then you WILL be disappointed. Set in smoke-filled, sepia-tinged 1970s, the film centres around theuncovering of a mole 'right at the top of the circus'. The 'circus' isthe British Intelligence Services and is made up of a who's who ofBritish acting talent - Firth, Hinds, Cumberbatch, Hardy, Strong andHurt. For the most part, the action takes place in the brown-suited andwall-papered world of England but we are given brief glimpses of thespy territory in Budapest, Paris and Istanbul. Smiley, playedinscrutably by Oldman, is tasked with uncovering the mole and is ablyassisted by Guillam, the ever-watchable Cumberbatch. Admittedly this is a slow-burn of a film, full of meaningful looks,pregnant pauses and one that hints at deeper and more complex plotstrands but it has an authentic air and it is a fascinating to observea build-up of tension and cold-war paranoia which culminates in adramatic if subdued fashion. Being slightly too young to have watchedthe original Alec Guiness TV series, I cannot make any directcomparisons and I imagine that a TV series allows much more time forplot and character development. The film must be judged on its ownmerits, and whilst I am sure that this will not be to many mainstreammovie-goers' tastes, it is one for those who are looking for a film ofa different type, time and pace.