Fridae

Ah, espionage. The Great Game. The multiple-layered chess games that work behind the machinations of politicians. To be a spy is to be an invisible pawn in a secret war waged every day in the shadows of an oblivious world; it's a tedious, dispiriting, sobering and souring experience into human nature. In the movies, however, it always looks like so much fun, just a way to see the world, meet beautiful women, drive nice cars, and kick lots of ass. Who can blame this myth really, for selling? It's no surprise that realistic films about espionage are rarely made, and mostly are based on material by well-established writers like John Le Carre and Len Deighton.

Le Carre's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy was previously an acclaimed British miniseries starring Alec Guinness as protagonist George Smiley, and now gets a gorgeous cinematic adaptation from Swedish director Tomas Alfredson that is probably the most intelligent and adult film of 2011. Alfredson, previously known for his coldly evocative adaptation of Let the Right One In, fits the material as snugly as a glove.

A secret operation in Budapest where MI6 operative Prideaux (played by the ever chameleonic Mark Strong) is rudely intercepted by Soviet agents disgracing MI6 (here known as 'the Circus') Chief Control (John Hurt) who is retired from service along with his right-hand man George Smiley (Gary Oldman). While Control dies shortly after, Smiley gets back in the game when operative Ricky Tarr (Tom Hardy) reveals to Undersecretary Oliver Lacon that there is a mole in the very highest levels of the British intelligence establishment. Smiley proceeds with a meticulous investigation that threads its way across numerous intrigues, where international diplomacy and office politics are as much enough to jeopardize your mission as well as any man with a gun. It is during the investigation that Smiley also comes to recognize that the trail of the mole leads back into his own history as a spy.

The film is breathtakingly meticulous in its recreation of the period, mid-to-late 70s Britain, when the punk movement was still nascent and Thatcherism had yet to rear its head, helped by a detailed and sophisticated script. Operatives at the Circus have their humanity revealed in small, telling gestures, rather than as the grave and serious digits of a gigantic state apparatus. Yet the level of realism offered means that unlike most movie spies who regularly stop for briefings so that the average audience member can catch up with what is being said, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy demands that the audience play catch up. Overall, it still remains a plot and thematic-driven story rather than a character-driven one, even if the strong performances all around from a cast that reads like a who's who of British talent old and new render all their parts with enough nuance and delicacy to be interesting; even if not enough to overcome the scant attention the script gives them in favour of its broader depiction of the intricacies of Cold War intrigues and the bleak mood of Britain's own Greatest Generation as they find themselves facing a murkier war than what they grew up with.

Well-acted, well-shot and gorgeously framed, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is the most intelligent and adult entertainment of 2011, its overall bleakness and lack of characterisation make it an easy film to admire but a tough film to like, but those willing to take the journey will find themselves in for a dark, strong drink of a movie in a world of Cola.