If you happen to be in Ireland this weekend…
Actually, that should read, "if you happen to be in County Leatrim this weekend"--which I will most certainly not be, unfortunately--you might want to check out this very intriguing film festival at the Cinema North West in Dromahaire.
The weekend's festivities will exclusively feature adaptations of John le Carré's works, including an opening presentation by John Irvin himself, director of the original Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Irvin is expected to speak for 2 hours about the mini-series starring Sir Alec Guinness that we've all gone ga-ga for.
TTSS set for general UK release today!
So it's finally here. Thirty-two years after the BBC adaptation and 37 years after the novel's original publication, the new feature film version of John le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy is now set for general release today in the United Kingdom. (Unfortunately those of us stateside will have to wait a few more months.)
All of the speculation and guesswork will end today--at least for Britons. Does it feel like Christmas morning, anyone?
Unfortunately the burrowers here at Smiley Watch are hopelessly behind on keeping up with the coverage in the British press. The volume of articles is intense. (Smiley Watchers should refer to the John le Carré official site for a great list of reviews.)
One article that stands out, however, is an interview with le Carré in the The Telegraph (UK). (Didn't le Carré give his last interview ever to CBS last March? Never mind.) He sums up the difference between Sir Alec Guinness's portrayal of Smiley and Oldman's performance in two succinct sentences: Continue reading...
A decade lost
The storm begins.
Ten years. An entire decade since 9-11. Incomprehensible.
Ten years and one day ago, few could have predicted the way the next decade would go--how badly it would turn out for so many different people from so many different places around the globe.
On Sept. 10, 2001, a lot of people were alive who are no longer with us. And they weren't just Americans. No one saw the shit storm coming.
Everybody has a 9-11 story--not many are interesting, a few are engrossing and incomprehensibly tragic.
For myself, my own story is one of the uninteresting ones--I thank God for that. I am going to share it anyway because, well, I own the blog.
Both my father and I had worked at the Bankers Trust building (later Deutschebank) across Liberty Street from the WTC, but mercifully we weren't there on 9-11, though we knew some who were as well as some who were in the Towers. Continue reading...
Finally, it’s here!
The world got its first look at the new Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy last night at the Venice Film Festival and the reviews are excellent.
From the photos and news stories, it looks like it was quite a night.
Of course, Smiley Watch had no presence in Venice.
The Smiley Watch foreign correspondent was denied a press pass for the event by the fascist dogs running the Venice Film Festival. Our best attempts at crashing the party ended in ignominious defeat.
Criminal charges are pending.
Nevertheless, the loyal Smiley Watchers out there have been posting articles from some of the media outlets that were allowed to attend.
I would encourage everyone to use this post for all Venice-related articles. I will be away this week, but will be back to cull through the results and provide hare-brained analysis soon.
TTSS Official Web Site is now online
TTSS Web Site
Well, we are truly in the home stretch now. Just days away from the Venice Film Festival debut and a couple of weeks from the UK release, the new Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy film now has an official Web site:
http://www.tinker-tailor-soldier-spy.com
Thanks to reader Rollo for the lead!
I haven't read through the whole site yet, but at least one interesting tid-bit stands out: Jerry Westerby's character is described as "Duty Manager at the Circus, there from the old days and is one of Control's more trusted personnel."
So it seems they've combined Sam Collins, Mendel and Westerby into one person and changed this new character's background to make him sort of a permanent duty manager at the Circus.
The change makes sense if your trying to "turn the cow into an Oxo cube", to use le Carré's words. But I, for one, will certainly miss Sam Collins, who, though a minor character, was one of my favorite in the Tinker, Tailor novel. At the end of the day, does this do much damage to the original material? I think not.
But how this will impact any Honourable Schoolboy sequel will be interesting to see. (TTSS isn't out yet and I'm already speculating about THS. Presumptuous?) Smiley Watchers will recall that both Jerry Westerby and Sam Collins play key roles in Schoolboy.
Couple of other interesting notes taken from the Web site: Continue reading...