Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy Movie Review

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is the kind of film we rely on the British to make, since Hollywood often seems incapable of producing movies that don't constantly explain themselves to the viewer, like we are six-year-old children. Indeed, at the screening I attended, I heard more than a few whispered conversations as people tried to follow what was going on. You might call that poor storytelling, but I call it a lack of patience brought on by years of Hollywood coddling. This is a film that definitely rewards the patient viewer.
Adapted from the novel by John Le Carré, the story is set in 1973, where the highest-tech spy gadget you'll find is the documents elevator that trundles through the walls of the British Secret Service headquarters at Whitehall. George Smiley (Gary Oldman), former second-in-command of the Service - which is nicknamed "The Circus" - has been pushed into early retirement after a failed mission sponsored by his leader Control (John Hurt) results in the apparent death of an agent. Smiley is approached by the Defence Minister, who tells him that Control suspected one of the Circus' upper executive to be a Soviet mole, and asks him to find out which one. This is a huge challenge, since Smiley can't enter the building, or interview any of the suspects. To find the mole, he must rely on second-hand information, vague clues, gossip, and his own memories of his former colleagues.

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