This Cold War spy classic sticks like glue to the plot of Le Carré's novel, and in doing so wisely retains the choicest of the searingly cynical dialogue as Richard Burton's wearied sham defector lays out the facts of life to Claire Bloom's innocent caught in the crossfire, or to Oskar Werner's ideologist on the other side of the fence.Le Carré's vision of the sordid, murky reality of the hidden conflict between East and West, beyond political ideology, must have come not a moment too soon to an audience in danger of being thoroughly drugged and seduced by the arrival of Bond's glamorous superspy. The decision here to go with black and white when it was already becoming extinct makes perfect sense: it complements the dirtiness and bleakness of the game played out between pawns and those yet to realise they're also pawns. And, at the centre, Richard Burton is simply perfect casting as an emotionally scarred pragmatist, only concerned with damage limitation, yet burning with a fierce morality despite it all.
8/10
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