Les Gens de Smiley

Original title: Smiley's People

TV Mini Series
1982
TV-14
1h

IMDb RATING

8.5/10

YOUR RATING

POPULARITY

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The murder of a Soviet defector forces his old handler, British spymaster George Smiley, out of retirement. His investigation leads to an old nemesis, the Soviet spymaster known only as "Kar... Read allThe murder of a Soviet defector forces his old handler, British spymaster George Smiley, out of retirement. His investigation leads to an old nemesis, the Soviet spymaster known only as "Karla". This will be their final dance.The murder of a Soviet defector forces his old handler, British spymaster George Smiley, out of retirement. His investigation leads to an old nemesis, the Soviet spymaster known only as "Karla". This will be their final dance.

Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

8.5/10

YOUR RATING

POPULARITY

4,715

291

Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

Nominated for 3 Primetime Emmys
- 4 wins & 9 nominations total

Episodes6

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Storyline

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Trivia
Simon Langton was brought in to direct this mini-series after Sir Alec Guinness demanded a change of directors because the initially assigned director had a reputation for bullying actors and actresses.

Goofs
When Smiley is talking to Connie Sachs, she mentions that Karla once had a mistress, upon which Smiley's eyes widen, and with an utterly surprised look, he asks "Who?" She then goes on to tell about how Karla also had a daughter from that relationship.

It's impossible that George Smiley, who spent most of his life gathering every bit of detail about Karla, and even wrote "The Karla papers" (according to Saul Enderby) wouldn't know about such a vital piece of information about his nemesis.

Quotes
Lauder Strickland: Oh dammit, George, that whole era is dead.
George Smiley: And so is Vladimir! And I wish to God we'd got half his courage and one tenth his integrity.

Crazy credits
The opening titles feature a set of wooden planks, on which yellow chalk marks (the secret signal used by the spies) are scrawled.

Connections
Featured in The 35th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards (1983)

User reviews52

Featured review

10/10

"Fantastic! George! All your life!"

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.