Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
AMC Loews Village 7, December 25, 2011
Movie #83 for 2011
IN 1973, George Smiley (GARY OLDMAN, pictured) comes out of forced retirement and back into the “The Circus” (that is, the British Secret Service) to hunt a mole among the same men he worked with for so long running the agency throughout the Cold War.
Director TOMAS ALFREDSON (Let the Right One In) - a very non-Hollywood director - has made a very non-Hollywood film. It is shot like the cold war -era films it is so deeply indebted to, with a slow pace and a nary an explosion to be found. It is shot with such an attention to detail (in character, set, costume, hair and makeup) that so much of the film is delicious context and rich texture. It makes the film feel positively literary, and fully-formed.
The cast is a lineup of talented British actors of a certain age - COLIN FIRTH, MARK STRONG, JOHN HURT, TOBY JONES, CIARAN HINDS - and they are impeccable. There are a couple of young ones in the mix too - most notably TOM HARDY and BENEDICT CUMMERBATCH - who hold their own among all that old school talent. All the acting is as understated as the brown and grey color palette, but as nuanced as the subtle period detail.
A couple of moments really stick out in a game of “one of these scenes is not like the other”. When the rest of the film - look and tone - is so carefully crafted, there are a few moments where it loses its elevation and sinks down into the ho-hum - a completely pointless sex scene here, a been-done-before revelation moment there and a plot with just one too many convolutions mar an otherwise subtle, stylish and original work.
