gbrack

A book as complex as Le Carré's can't be filmed without serious compression of the plot, but this mess wilfully makes unnecessary changes - look at the character of the Hon. Jerry Westerby, for example, as shown here and as written - and fails to explain some key elements of the plot. The result is that, having watched matters unwind slowly over two hours, we are suddenly led to what looks very much like Smiley having suddenly noticed something he should have seen before. There is absolutely no description of what the men at the top of the Circus do or of their pasts - Bland in particular seems to be paid for doing nothing very much - and some incidents that have lost their point because the story has been changed. One example is the befriending of the schoolboy Bill by a major character.

On the plus side, Mark Strong is convincing as Prideaux, and Gary Oldman does what he can with the part of George Smiley. Tom Hardy does a good job as Ricki Tarr, and David Dencik provides an interesting portrayal of Toby Esterhase. On the other hand, John Hurt plays John Hurt very well, and Toby Jones makes you wonder why anyone with half a brain would give Sir Percy Alleline any position of responsibility whatsoever. This is not the fault of the actors - they haven't been given much of a hand to play.

The film is atmospheric and, I suppose, is an interesting enough film in its own right, but it isn't the film of the book. Whether the book is, ultimately, filmable may be doubtful.

From the introduction (a manager of the Budapest Metro politely pointing out that his inspectors don't act this way but that they were pleased to co-operate with Antal) to the closing redemptive sequence, this is an intense experience. A group of misfits united by their job and living in a subterranean world that is at once familiar and utterly unlike our own. It ranges from comedy to thriller, involves some chases, fights and a bit of vomiting.

Filmed entirely at night on the Metro, it uses its locations well and is cleverly lit to make the setting look bluer, colder and less neon-filled than the real thing. If the film is to be believed, there are some strange characters riding the Metro in Budapest, many of them employed by the Metro itself.

Did any film heroine ever look more appealing at first sight than Eszter Bella? And I won't spoil it by telling you why she appeals, but she's fully clothed.

It's hard to describe to those who didn't see it, but "Never Mind the Quality" ought still to be viewable today. The large audiences it got may indicate that it had a broad appeal that is unlikely for a destructive or biased programme (though not impossible, as the big audiences for "Love thy neighbour" may prove). I think the reason is that while a lot of the humour arose from one lead being Catholic and the other Jewish, there was very little negativity. The two characters tried to understand each other's viewpoints, but they genuinely couldn't do so. It was puzzlement rather than dislike that drove misunderstandings. For example, in one episode Manny is unable to understand why his partner is so concerned about looking after a plaster statuette of the Virgin Mary; he doesn't want to be irreverent, he just takes the view that there are thousands of them on sale and if it breaks you just buy another one.

Hard to realise it's nearly 40 years since these were made.