Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Published 2025-02-09

Film info

Title Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
Director Tomas Alfredson
Year 2011
Run time 2hr 7m
Genres Mystery, Drama, Thriller
Tagline How do you find an enemy who is hidden right before your eyes?
Cast Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt, Toby Jones, Mark Strong, Benedict Cumberbatch

In the bleak days of the Cold War, espionage veteran George Smiley is forced from semi-retirement to uncover a Soviet mole within his former colleagues at the heart of MI6.

Live blog

Time	Comment
6:08	Oh, I like Mark Strong, he wasn't in it for long enough!
10:49	Loving their top secret sound-proofed on stilts rooms. I want one.
17:59	"I'm retired. You fired me." Not the same thing.
25:11	Just me, or is John Hurt entirely the voice of the dragon and nothing else?
34:35	Must be so hard to be outside of the loop as a retired/fired spy.
39:30	Yay, he’s back in it!
52:28	I love that the name ‘Circus’ was presumably derogatory to start with but becomes sort of official.
1:06:46	Benedict’s hair in this is a real choice. He looks like a 00s boyband member.
1:17:14	“After today, Peter, you have to assume they’re watching you. If there’s anything you haven’t tidied up…” So chilling!
1:28:46	Tinker Tailor Soldier Poor Man?
1:41:51	Let’s go for a walk on a runway.
1:59:55	Odd choice for a headshot.

Thoughts

I always think I'm going to really like spy movies, all that intrigue and double crossing and stuff. But most of the time I end up not knowing what's going on and just enjoying the pretty pictures. This one was something similar, but it wasn't helped by the pace of it. It's a slow, slow movie, and is very much a style over substance production. The cast is incredible, naturally, stacked full of great names but they don't seem to connect very well - whether friend or foe - and so I ended up feeling a bit disappointed by the whole thing. Especially because Gary Oldman is so good!

Rating: 2 / 5