Went to see it last night, cracking film, some good contemporary motors (including an Alvis and a Citroen DS that had a starring role) well worth Bargain Tuesday at the local Cineworld.
Trouble is kept expecting Colin Firth to stutter....
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I want to see it but by the time I am back from 2 weeks out of UK it will have gone from my Odeon, cineworld multi-screen etc and I shall have to buy the DVD! Rats!
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I tried to read the book when it came out.
Gave up because I couldn't follow it, too many twists and turns in the plot for my simple mind.
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His books did become less readable. I gave up at The Tailor of Panama.
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I won't be watching it. I think the Arthur Hopcraft TV series and the book itself are the bees knees.
Almost every winter I re-read the books and we re-watch the DVDs, rationing ourselves to an episode of TTSS and Smiley's People per Sunday evening, just like it was originally. Even though, of course, I now know every word of the dialogue.
I don't see how the nuance and subtlety of the original can be compressed into a couple of hours.
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There was a fair stab at it in fairness. May treat myself to the box sets though.
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14 quid for the three BBC series - bargain...!
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RP =I have found TTSP & Smiley's People for £9 on Amazon but what was the third of the series to which you refer!
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The Spy Who Came In From The Cold
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Thanks! It was bleakly brilliant - Richard Burton and Claire Bloom I think
Last edited by: Meldrew on Wed 21 Sep 11 at 18:25
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The third (actually middle) book of the Karla trilogy was The Honourable Schoolboy, which centred on Jerry Westerby and the Far East. It didn't make it onto the screen AFAIK.
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...Gave up because I couldn't follow it, too many twists and turns in the plot for my simple mind.
Perhaps a broader one would help, Iffy - bit more room for manoeuvre.
};---)
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Thanks for reminding me of these.
On the way down now!
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>> and I
>> shall have to buy the DVD! Rats!
>>
I can't go to the cinema any more, so it'll have to be the DVD (reminder set up on Amazon to let me know when it's coming in), although as i've splashed out on a decent surround sound system, it's the preferred option anyway (beer/wine is available and you can stop it for 'comfort breaks').
The last time i'll ever, ever go to a cinema went something like this:
Imagine a man fast heading for middle age, with subtlety and patience beginning to be a distant memory, sat in the foyer of a modern cinema with his 9 years younger, blonde missus, who he's had to persuade to come to view a one off digitally re-mastered version of the Dambusters in black and white...(and a right old bargain at that).
Mr W (loudly)"You have got to be joking..."
Mrs W "What now"
Mr "Take a look over there"
Mrs "I can't see anything wrong"
Mr "How about that woman in the blue coat"
Mrs "What's wrong with her"
Mr "What is she carrying"
Mrs "A carrier bag".......(see through)
Mr "Yes, a carrier bag full of crisps"
Mrs "Well there's nothing to suggest she'll be going in to our film"
Mr "Well which other film being shown tonight will a woman in her 60's be going to view then"?
...and sure enough, in she went...and she scoffed all the crisps...continuously...the miserable, selfish old bag. Why oh why couldn't she stuff her face before or after the film..or take along a bag of marshmallows?
Last edited by: VxFan on Fri 23 Sep 11 at 00:52
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In the very early fifties, when I must have been about 12, I went to a showing in the one cinema in Fishguard of a recently made Hamlet, black and white with Laurence Olivier and Claire Bloom playing the leads, but I can't swear to it.
Anyway the Fishguard cinema audience didn't think much of Ophelia floating down the river among blossoms, about to die and singing pathetically. 'There's dull she looks!' was one audible comment. It wasn't exactly a chorus of catcalls, but the audience was more than restive.
The provinces, don'tcha just love 'em? It's a hard life Westpig for us cultured folk...
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>> The last time i'll ever, ever go to a cinema went something like this:
>>
You got the audible assault from the general public, we got the assault of the nasal passages the very last time we attended the hell that is the cinema.
One side we had the stinking cigarette smoker who must have puffed a whole packet of Woodies just before the film...and in the blue corner ladies and gentlemen (the geezer the other side of us) the alcholic, stinking of booze.
It's been so often the same and like you i cannot stand it.
One word of warning though, this is just the start, next you'll find that you simply can't face the hell of a shopping area, further down the line you realise you've become a total recluse...trust me it's Heaven on earth.
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>> One word of warning though, this is just the start, next you'll find that you
>> simply can't face the hell of a shopping area, further down the line you realise
>> you've become a total recluse...trust me it's Heaven on earth.
>>
Too late...it's internet shopping or nothing....and tomorrow we move from London to Devon...yee hah.
...and our only family holiday this year (trying to save some money)...2 weeks in a very remote Scottish Highland cottage...in October. Walk the dogs on utterly empty beaches, 7 miles down a deserted road for the milk and papers, real fire in the grate.....bliss.
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>> Trouble is kept expecting Colin Firth to stutter....
>>
Apparently he actually developed a stutter in real life, and had to work to cure it.
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Free John le Carré Audiobooks download courtesy of the Guardian this week
All this week you can download free John Le Carre Audiobooks courtesy of the Guardian.
www.guardian.co.uk/books/series/john-le-carre-free-audiobooks
Three are already available (Tinker Tailor, Soldier, Spy - The Honourable Schoolboy - Our Kind of Traitor) with the promise of more including 'Smileys People' to complete the 'Karla Trilogy' later this week.
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Thanks Tigger - ideal stuff to listen to when mewing the lawn ! :-)
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>> Thanks Tigger - ideal stuff to listen to when mewing the lawn ! :-)
>>
mewing! Brilliant!!!
8o)
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Off to see it tonight in Aylesbury.
It will be interesting to see if the audience is all of an age, or if the youngsters turn up and walk out when there's no CGI!
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If you can identify the Fiat shown in at least a couple of shots - a virtual pint will be yours...always fancied them in 1973...!
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I watched the first episode of the TV version of TTSS last night.
I dis see it all on TV when first released and enjoyed it then, so re-visiting after all these years will be interesting.
What a cast it had - any of the players could be the central character in their own series these days, such was their talent.
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Seeing it this pm. Can remember the TV series.. brilliant.
Forgotten the plot - a bit.. but with all the twists who can recall it all?
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Didn't see your post before I went RP, and didn't spot the Fiat. In one of the opening scenes is a 'table' type road hump that I don't think would have been there in 1973.
Good film, and worth seeing. Easier to follow than seven one hour episodes at weekly intervals. Gary Oldman is convincing but I wouldn't say better than Alec Guinness (or worse).
Some of the scenes were a bit rushed as a consequence of it being 'compressed' to two hours.
Recommended for those with any interest at all in cold war spying.
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A great disappointment.
Cold war thrillers = paranoia plus scares.
Great actors should have characters.
Too short, flitted from (great) place to place but characteres were cardboard cutouts and no paranoia largely because book is too long and complex to fit into 2 hours and 10 mins.
Greatly over-rated.
Did not catch my imagination at all. Woke at 5am mentally reviewing why so disappointed.
Gary Oldman was terrible. Acted by no facial expressions and blank stares.
Score: 3 out of 10.
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Watched it last night
Excellent. Garry Oldman was brilliant, and played the part with a cool cold ruthless and slightly vengeful persona. I loved the way it slowly built the tension, and the cinematography was superb, wonderfully lit in a kind of grey slightly hostile tone. Locations and attention to period detail was spot on.
Recently watched the BBC series, but this was subtly different, enough to keep me interested, mostly because Firth played a different Bill Haydon.
Of course the book will always need to be cut down, and purists will always decry the fact.
Oh and one for GB, who refuses to go to the cinema. Watched it in a nice little cinema, only two screens, 120 seats in each. Cafe and bar in the foyer, lets you take your drinks (in glasses if you have beer or wine) into the cinema Took my coffee (in a large china mug) into the picture.
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>>Oh and one for GB, who refuses to go to the cinema. Watched it in a nice little cinema, only two screens, 120 seats in each. Cafe and bar in the foyer, lets you take your drinks (in glasses if you have beer or wine) into the cinema Took my coffee (in a large china mug) into the picture.
I feel like GB about mainstream cinemas these days, but I watched Tinker Tailor at the Aylesbury Odeon in relative peace and quiet. Most of the audience was about the same age as George Smiley.
Three of us went. By the time Mrs Dugong had successively deployed the 2 for 1 offer, the discount card, and two seniors concessions (the other two, I'm the youngest) she had whittled the £27.70 headline ticket cost down to about £15. We stayed off the overpriced comestibles, as did most of the sensibly cardiganed audience, and it was a good do.
GB, look out for 'Flicks in the Sticks'. The nearby village hall is showing The King's Speech on 14th October. £6, bar open, and free hot snacks at half time. Great atmosphere. Shall I get you a ticket?
Last edited by: Manatee on Sat 1 Oct 11 at 11:36
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Gb is not that far away from Stamford. the arts centre their shows films about a month after the main releases, and the average audience age is about 60
Tickets are about 6 quid I think.
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Watched it in
>> a nice little cinema, only two screens, 120 seats in each.
Sounds good Z.
Looking forward to the film being released or DVD or Sky's films, and enjoy in the peace and tranquility of home which has sound and sight good enough for cinema.
It will have to be good to better the original TV series, we really did make some high quality productions back then among the dross.
I'd prefer modern productions to be serialised too as these quality programs were (Blott on the Landscape was excellent too), so much is skipped otherwise that detracts from the subtle twists and moods of the book....it can work.
Gary Oldman a good choice...he portrays slightly barking and thoroughly evil people so well, his Drug Enforcement role in Leon was superb.
If any of you haven't seen Leon starring Jean Reno, do rent it, especially the directors cut or extended version, a lot was cut from the released film that ties the story together.
EDIT...thanks Manatee and Z, food for thought indeed, the thought of ever venturing inside the hell of a main cinema with it's target customers is too much, will give the alternatives some thought.
Last edited by: gordonbennet on Sat 1 Oct 11 at 11:53
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Agree with the Arts Centre deals - less than a fiver at the place where I steward. I get in free though ! :-)
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>> Agree with the Arts Centre deals - less than a fiver at the place where
>> I steward. I get in free though ! :-)
+1. Saw The Big Sleep (the 1942? Bogart version) at Leighton Buzzard Theatre recently. What a cracking film. They have Tinker Tailor on 17th & 18th November. Good little venue.
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The Gala Theatre arts complex in Durham City has two small cinema screens, one of which is currently showing Tinker Tailor, Soldier, Spy.
I've not been, but those that have speak of an experience more agreeable than the multiplexes.
But it wouldn't suit gb.
It's in the middle of Durham City which means cinema - and theatre - goers have to mix with the circuit drinkers on the way in and out.
www.galadurham.co.uk/company/AboutUs.php
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Went to see it t'other night at the Showcase on Hyde Road in Manchester. It was the 9.45 showing but me and a friend were the only people in there. At least I could take my shoes off and stick my feet on the back of the seat in front without feeling guilty!
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>> Went to see it t'other night at the Showcase on Hyde Road in Manchester. It
>> was the 9.45 showing but me and a friend were the only people in there
A sub-tribe of the Philistines, the Mancunians.
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Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. - Meldrew
