With a teaser like this, how could Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy not have been my most anticipated release of 2011? Such a succinctly edited glimpse into the dangerous days of Cold War espionage, reinforced by a tantalizing ensemble cast and a riveting score, had me chomping at the bit. The problem, however, with that wonderful advert is it bears no resemblance to Tomas Alfredson’s final work.
Where the teaser had my imagination running wild at the prospect of some cross-pollination between Inception and a Tony Gilroy film, the reality is Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a quiet affair more to do with the “dirty laundry” of the Circus, code for British counter-intelligence agency MI5, than the superhuman escapades of rogue agents. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy has more in common with the slow burn of The Conversation or the Red Riding trilogy (with the latter’s drab aesthetic), most of the action takes place off-screen, and the taut, dramatic score of the teaser is nowhere to be found (it’s actually from Danny Elfman’s work on The Wolfman if you can believe that), all of which is to say the film is a far-cry from the thrill-a-minute spy games so deceptively teased in the marketing.
As such my digestion of that first viewing was as challenged by my attempts to realign my expectations as it was trying to sort out the tangled web of reminisced relationships and disorientating flashbacks. Having since learned what John le Carré’s novel did for the spy genre upon its release in the early seventies, namely to portray spies as the furthest thing imaginable from James Bond, made more sense of things, but it quickly became clear Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy demanded a second viewing.
That next screening was revelatory, as if I were watching a different movie altogether. I soaked in the subtext and relished each line of dialogue, rich with themes of identity in post-War Britain, as new meanings opened before my very eyes. I basked in the skillful direction of Tomas Alfredson (Let The Right One In)—his immaculate framing of every shot, a meticulous attention to period detail, the entrancing tension in the most mundane of espionage work—and the masterful performances by both promising up-and-comers (Tom Hardy, Benedict Cumberbatch) and British institutions (John Hurt, Colin Firth, Toby Jones) alike.
And then there’s Gary Oldman’s “retired” George Smiley who, to borrow a phrase from Capone (who borrowed it in turn from another critic long ago), upon entering a room, makes the room emptier. Oldman’s performance is simply on another level especially given his tendency towards over-the-top roles (see his work with Luc Besson). The subtlety he brings to George Smiley, as we repeatedly revisit the mystery of a botched mission in Budapest unfolding under his owl-like gaze, further magnified by his rather large spectacles, is among the most impressive and understated performances in the genre.
In the end, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy sits in a place of high esteem with me, just perhaps in a different one than I imagined all those months ago. It is a film that requires absolute concentration, and even then may still remain befuddling, but it rewards those that pay attention with an intricate, grounded drama more concerned with humdrum threats of deceipt, loyalty, and gossip gone too far than the playboy antics of a one-man killing machine.
