So, Tinker Tailor Solder Spy...

There is always a danger when something is so highly anticipated that it doesn't quite live up to expectation and I think that that, together with a rather fidgety audience member sat two seats away contributed to dampening my enjoyment of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

It's not that this isn't a very good film. It is extremely polished, subtle and tense. And as you would imagine from such a quality director and dream cast*, the acting is brilliant. The period detail is also superb.

I think my beef with it, is that the character development suffers from the condensing of a book into a two hour film. John Le Carre's novel is a complex thriller about an investigation into a Russian mole at the top of MI6 during the cold war. OK they are spies and thus by their very nature should have an element of mystery about them but there is actually relatively little screen time devoted to the principle suspects with little more than a shifty looks to go on.

As a result by the time the identity of the mole is revealed, I'm not sure I was really that bothered.

This is a slow burn film peppered with the odd highly intense moment, as you would expect from a piece about spies spying on spies. It all fits satisfactorily together in the end but walking out the cinema it was more of a shrug than a smile from me.

I'm going to give it 65% based on the acting and production. It's got a user rating of 82% on IMDb but no Metacritic listing yet. On Rotten Tomatoes the critics seem to adore it with a rating of 97% while users have given it 76%.

* Gary Oldman, Kathy Burke, Benedict Cumberbatch, Ciaran Hinds, Toby Jones, Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, Mark Strong and John Hurt, I mean come on.

 

Comments

[Simon Pudsey]

I'm going to stick the book on the Kindle and catch a rewatch when the DVD is on cheapo next year

[Rev Stan]

Agree, think there was definitely room for a bit more character development. I was listening to Gary Oldman being interviewed by Simon Mayo and Mark Kermode on the podcast today and it's made me curious to see it again. Not sure if I'll fit it in as I've got a bit of catching up to do after being out of the game last weekend.

[Simon Pudsey]

We saw this last night and I would concur with much of what you have said. My only slight criticism is almost identical, in that I felt the introduction to the "players" was all too rapid and felt superficial. I can appreciate that this was essential but surely an extra 30-40mins wouldn't have been too much of a chore to add.. I am sure that the target audience would have had the patience for this.