Classic espionage thriller that required more running time than well-known faces.

Rating: 8/10 (26 December 2012)

The running time of the movie is roughly half to that of the TV series. It's running time demands many key subplots be cut short. Yet, the wonderful editing and screenplay make this is a must-watch espionage movie.
The screenplay of the movie, I felt, was written on the assumption that the movie-goers would have watched the TV series as well. Many key sentences that should have been spoken are simply shown as perceived and understood by the other characters, which might be a little difficult for those who have neither watched the TV series nor read the book.
Alberto Iglesias' soothing reboot of the soundtrack from the TV series is one of the facets that I liked in the movie.
Gary Oldman hasn't outperformed Alec Guinness' performance as the cagey George Smiley but I'm sure no other actor in the present day would have come close to Gary Oldman's portrayal of Smiley, a performance that fetched him a long-awaited Academy award nomination.
A movie that deserves the rave reviews that it received.