Before John Le Carré hit it big with his novel The Spy Who Came in
from the Cold, he had already published two novels that even after all his
fame are still fairly obscure. Le Carré whose real name was David
Cornwell was working for MI6 at the time and hoping that his writing would
bring in a few hundred pounds to add to his meagre Civil Service salary.
He wrote this one while on duty in Berlin and said the idea came to him because
of his hatred for his days at English boarding schools. He wrote in his introduction
to this book "I found them monstrous. Boys beat other boys, housemasters
beat boys and even the Headmaster beat boys. I loathed them".
The first one, Call for the Dead, was a spy novel while this one is a straight
out murder mystery. The main character in both is the honorable George Smiley
who became famous with Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy over a decade later.
But before that he also makes appearances in both The Spy Who Came in from
the Cold and The Looking Glass War. In both these early novels Le Carré
begins to build the character of Smiley and putter around with his disastrous
marriage to Ann. Which played a large role in TTSS. We are fortunate that
Le Carré decided to stick with espionage rather than become a mystery
writer. Enough of those around but no one could write about spycraft as he
did,
Here he is portrayed by Denholm Elliot and it is a bit of an adjustment.
For me only Alec Guinness should be allowed to play Smiley. Even after death.
He is ok but not steely enough - with Guinness you could look at Smiley's
placid face and see a killer in his cold eyes. Elliot can't quite capture
that - he just seems fussy - and the script is too busy with too many characters
who never take shape to really give him those Smiley moments of clarity.
He does solve the murder - two of them - but it sort of comes out of the
blue. And it takes too long getting there. It is a bit of a slog as
Smiley bicycles around the village looking for clues. What he has of course
is an ability to get people to talk to him. An acquired skill in his field.
He is relaxing at home - seemingly on the outs again with the top echelon
- when a friend of his (Glenda Jackson) asks him to look into something.
She has received a letter as the editor of a small magazine from a woman
saying her husband was going to kill her. Smiley makes a call and finds out
that she has in fact just been brutally murdered. He goes there and partners
up with the local police. He becomes entwined in the poisonous, gossipy backstabbing,
class conscious staff and their spouses at the boarding school. Every one
seems to have hated this woman including her husband. But only one of them
killed her. Also in the cast is Joss Ackland, Billie Whitelaw and a young
Christian Bale as a student.
