Les Gens de Smiley

This is the sequel to the Tinker Tailor mini-series and last chapter in the Karla Trilogy (they skipped 'schoolboy'). Nothing has fundamentally changed: Smiley is brought out of retirement for one last round of spy games against Karla, his old nemesis. The 'old guard' which he visits (Connie, Esterhase) looks phased and weathered. The moral lines are blurry. The notion is that the world has changed, and doesn't really need these people any more. Smiley will be disowned by the Circus if discovered.

That's all fine. The series is from the great BBC tradition in narrative: the acting is uniformly excellent, it is a clean and riveting piece of fiction. Moreover, it is filmed in that BBC way I adore—transparent camera, natural light and textures.

Which brings me to a point I made in my Tinker Tailor post. I recommend this simply on its storytelling capacity to immerse you. And if you want a glimpse of how 1970's West Europe was like, it is indispensable viewing, absolutely so.

But, it's also a spy film, and a spy film is to my mind one of the best templates for cinematic meditation.

Here's what I mean. You enter a world of some complexity that has machinery and movement, but enter long after the machinery has been set in motion. In the films, you (in the detective's shoes) are looking for this or that narrative device, here it turns out to be a girl, doesn't matter.

In this film, the story really has started long before we enter, but you only learn this as you move through the first couple of episodes—in other words, midway through you suddenly have memories of this world. (one episode is capped by Smiley actually having a flashback)

So, because you have only a partial view of the story (reflected in the film in a crucial bit of evidence being a film strip), and the story shifts as you move through (indeed, you don't know there is a testimony that goes with the strip), this would be like a chess game where each new move shuffles the rules, trying to make sense is not enough. You will have to be still long enough for the thing to reveal itself. You have to spy.

Isn't this nice? You as a viewer will have to be able to see every corner while not being bogged down by detail. Indeed, whereas the bulk of intelligence operatives work as analysts, a good analyst is worth his weight in gold because he does just this: he can flow through a sea of information, salvaging only the crucial bits, the anchors that explain the story.

So, my notion of a good spy film is one that makes watching itself have agency in the world—any film would benefit from this, hence why a template. This is a step-up from Tinker Tailor, where after each episode we were summoned for a recap by the master sleuth, everything smoothed out for us.

Oh, later episodes are forwarded by explanatory monologues and the story, as it turns out, is a personal bet so doesn't threaten an empire, but you have this structure and double identity of the girl at the center, which are fresh and powerful devices. And the sense of place is powerful —Paris, the Hamburg strip club and lake camp, quiet picturesque Bern, Berlin and the simmering anxiety of the Wall.

But the best piece of news is this: there is talk of a sequel to the recent Tinker Tailor film, which is going to be this one (alas for 'Schoolboy').

The film has what both of these don't, though they are otherwise excellent. It has abstraction in the film. It has not just the 'magicians' tricks, but magic that alters how we see. So, I'm hoping they go ahead with it, they will be building—as the first time—from a great primary text.

I won't choose between TINKER TAILOR and SMILEY'S PEOPLE. They're both first-rate. PEOPLE isn't as dark (even though bodies litter the landscape), but it builds to great tension even on repeat viewings.

Master-class performances by Michael Lonsdale (Grigoriev), Michael Gough (Mikhel), Eileen Atkins (Ostrakova), and even the unknown Stephen Riddle (Mostyn). Paul Herzberg's good simple Villem is a treat, and Beryl Reid as Connie Sachs does an even better job than in TINKER, showing Connie's mind a little further gone. Even the bit parts knock it out of the park with authenticity.

I was really glad that the Toby Esterhase character was finally given his linguistic head in this series. His Hungarian-English popcorn speech ("Fantastic! George! All your life!") is brought to life by Bernard Hepton, reprising his role from TINKER and showing himself equal to the novels' original dialog.

The SMILEY'S PEOPLE Special Features DVD has a different interview with John le Carré than the TINKER one does. Be sure to watch them both.

As far as I know, neither `Smiley's People', nor its prequel, `Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy', is available in the US in BBC packaging (the current distributor) so you'll have to use your initiative if you want them. I acquired my copies of `Smiley's People' and `Tinker, Tailor' through my video guy, who makes a couple of trips every year to London to shop for Euro-only products. I then had them re-coded to the U.S. playback standard. I would urge collectors to definitely acquire both titles. Having both really gives you something to sink into. Although either title can easily stand alone, they dovetail beautifully. Only the re-casting of a couple of principal supporting roles detracts slightly from the otherwise airtight continuity between the two. If you've read the book, you know the plot. If you have not read it (admittedly, LeCarré is not for everyone), here's an appetizer:

Retired British counter-intelligence operative George Smiley (Sir Alec Guinness in a remarkably nuanced performance) becomes aware, through events linked to the murder of a former colleague, that his seemingly invulnerable arch-rival in Soviet counter-intelligence, known to the western intelligence fraternity as `Karla', may have finally exposed an Achilles heel. (Some years earlier, as recounted in the more episodic yet excellent `Tinker, Tailor', Karla nearly destroyed British counter-intelligence, wrecking Smiley's marriage in the process). Going on an initial hunch and a fragment of evidence, turned up in a beautiful sequence reminiscent of a similar scene in Antonioni's `Blow Up', Smiley methodically begins to put the pieces together, despite the fact that almost everyone he knows is advising him to go home and don his robe and slippers. At the same time Karla, realizing that he has probably jeopardized himself by bending his own rigidly-enforced rules, is ruthlessly trying to cover his own tracks. Karla (introduced in a fascinating, wordless performance by Patrick Stewart in `Tinker, Tailor') is no comic book villain but a brilliant, almost monumental adversary who survived Stalin's purges, rising through the labyrinth of Soviet socio-politics to the pinnacle of power.

`Smiley's People' is a tale of revenge. If, as the saying goes, revenge is a dish best served cold, or at least cool, Smiley's is the coolest possible variety, barely visible through a professionalism honed by years in the Cold War trenches. Moving resolutely around or through all obstacles, he eventually collects the evidence needed to secure the support of Sir Saul Enderby, current chief of the revamped, cynical British counter-intelligence service (termed by LeCarré `The Circus'). Barry Foster, the eerily incandescent serial killer in Alfred Hitchcock's `Frenzy', portrays the suave, power-loving Enderby, an arch-bureaucrat with more clout than credibility, whose vanity will not let him begrudge Smiley any acknowledgement of his brilliant and courageous work. Their scene together, in which Enderby tries and fails to push Smiley's buttons, all of which have been hermetically sealed by decades of experience, is a delight. `Smiley's People' operates largely on this sort of intimate, interpersonal level. Some of its greatest pleasures are found in scenes that center on the unflinching Smiley and his elegant, slightly honest, former master of spy-tradecraft, Toby Esterhaze (Bernard Hepton). Smiley recruited Esterhaze from the Vienna gutters at the end of the World War II and to open a line of fire on Karla, reactivates him to compromise and turn one of the Soviet spymaster's European operatives. (If Toby had been Nixon's Chief of Staff during the Watergate crisis, the Nixster would probably still be president.) The initial meeting between Smiley and Esterhaze, their first since a rather unfriendly encounter in `Tinker, Tailor', is masterful, almost poetic.

Even in its somewhat streamlined, screen version `Smiley's People' is complex and dimensional, requiring full attention at all times. Crucial elements of dialog dart past while you blink (you'll become an adept rewinder). LeCarré's novel is screened as a series of beautifully-wrought set pieces; for the most part quiet interactions between detailed, believable characters who are driven by equally believable motivations, from the petty through the desperate. The settings jump from London to Paris to Hamburg to Berne and back as Smiley whittles each lead to heartwood. Not a shot is fired during the entire film, but the background menace against which Smiley operates is unmistakable. The very lethal Karla has known, almost from the start, that he has acquired a bogey. But he does not know that it is Smiley, whom Karla thought retired and out of the game, who is now on his tail. Smiley must work quickly and precisely while staying hidden, knowing that if he is discovered, he and anyone with whom he is currently associated, will almost certainly be eliminated. Karla's nickname in the west is `The Sandman'. Anyone, anywhere, who has ever threatened him has been permanently put to sleep. Karla will be especially responsive to Smiley, for it was he who unmasked Karla's highly-placed and destructive double-agent in `Tinker, Tailor', through whom Karla had been manipulating the entire western intelligence community for decades.

As events proceed in their intimate, quiet way, the suspense builds like layers of paint, one thin coat at a time. It's hard to resist, even after numerous screenings. Although `Smiley's People' is a serious thriller, in some places exhibiting an almost documentary realism, it is also poignant. Many of its characters, some decent, some less so, their lives all but car-baled by Stalinism, are now living out tenuous gray-scale existences, still under the cornice of Soviet power, despite the fact that they now reside in the west. The restrained, mournful score further accentuates the film's underlying emotionality. The acting is superb down through the smallest role. Even the editing, skillfully introducing and interweaving the corollary plot lines is first-rate. I screen `Smiley's People' every few months and never tire of it. If you appreciate LeCarré, espionage-based drama, or are simply looking for a temporary antidote to rampant ageism, you should see or collect this masterpiece. It's a gourmet meal for the mind.

The merits of Alec Guinness's Smiley are familiar to anyone who has seen this wonderful BBC adaptation of LeCarré's great 'Karla' trilogy of books..well, two of the books anyway. Sadly they skipped over 'The Honourable Schoolboy' arguably the most exciting of the three.

Both 'Tinker Tailor' and 'Smiley's People' have their casting mishaps but nothing that detracts in any important way. I found Eileen Atkins' Ostrakova to be wildly miscast, physically, but masterfully acted, so she gets a pass. Michael Byrne's Guillam is an improvement over his predecessor in 'Tinker Tailor' but his part is so small that it hardly registers. Beryl Reid's scene as Connie Sachs is longer than her scene in 'Tinker Tailor' but still woefully short of the involved and fascinating scene in the book. It is in regards to Sachs and Jerry Westerby that I deeply regret the BBC not making 'The Honourable Schoolboy.' Reid would have been fabulous in that role, though still not nearly fat or tall enough to wear the original Connie's shoes.

Generally the actors are superb. There is an especially moving and unforgettable performance from Tulle Silberg as Alexandra Ostrakova. Her scene with Smiley is deeply touching and it is easy to understand why Smiley does what he does in the end. I won't say any more to avoid a spoiler.

'Smiley's People' is not as riveting as 'Tinker Tailor' I think because I found the first mini- series, focusing on the inner workings of the Circus, to be far more interesting than the foreign "outside" locations in 'Smiley's People.' But that's just me. I still love this film and watch it often.

Don't miss the Smiley series! The BBC will never make anything like it again, on the evidence of the mediocre bilge they've been catting up in recent years.

I have to say I loved this and it got better as the story unravelled. This was something that is all too rare now - a story which takes it's time and teats the viewer as an adult (a great antidote for all the Hollywood contrived happy endings that make me bilious just to think of them). I love the fact that we didn't have a clue what was going on til almost half weay through, I loved the fact that we didn't need every small detail explained ad nausium, but most of all I loved the fact you had to pay attention, listen and think for a change. Guinness was his usual flawless self and wonderfully under-stated, but I must admit to getting twinges of Deadringers in the car showroom every now and then. And to those who did not understand Barry Fosters over-the-top portrayal of Saul Enderby - that was the point he was meant to be a thoroughly tasteless David Brent character, right down to his Eton tie.