No doubt very interesting... but hardly watchable for even an advanced film audience.

Rating: 4/10 (15 April 2012)

I consider myself to be well above average intelligence and well above average film viewing experience, but I seriously struggled to understand more than just the basic plot (well I got that after reading the plot outline beforehand). If you would have asked me directly after the film "Give me a summary of what happened there, and who was who and who did what.", I really would have struggled to come up with a sensible answer.
In the end it reminds me a lot of films directed by George Clooney like Syriana. New characters, semi-connected events, snippets from conservations, new locations and different points in time come racing by so fast that it makes your head spin. In hindsight the details of the plot and how everything is connected become (a bit) clearer, and some things made me go "oh of course, that was connected to this or that". But because of the rate in which these elements pass by and the seemingly haphazard and minimalistic way in which supposedly logical steps in the plot are portrayed, I really couldn't keep up with it while watching the film.
And much like the film Syriana, this film gives you the feeling that the sense of chaos caused by how intricately complicated things tend to be in a geopolitical/economical setting (Syriana) or an espionage/intelligence setting (Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy), seems to be exactly the effect that the film is deliberately trying to achieve in it's viewing experience. Well if their intention was to convey a sense of chaos, congratulations, they succeeded masterfully at that. But that really isn't my definition of a film as a worthwhile viewing experience.
Don't get me wrong, the cast was really impressive, the music and the locations were beautiful and the acting excellent. And I'm really not suggesting that every film has to come in bite-size chunks. But if an intelligent person with an advanced film viewing experience (and I wasn't the only one) is struggling to keep up with the plot, there is definitely something wrong with the film as a 'film', i.e. as an overall viewing experience.
Thoughts that come to my mind are:

Wouldn't it have been possible to convey the message or thought that they were trying to convey, with a film with half the number of characters (maximum) that were in this film now?

Could we introduce some sort of warning label for films that have as one of their main goals to convey a sense of the chaos and intricateness of the events and relations that form its setting, so next time I will be able to avoid them?

Or should writers who don't know how to select, compact, trim and condense so to speak, maybe be prevented from trying to make a book into a film?

By the way, one might reason that the film might be a easier to follow after one has read the book (which admittedly I didn't), but I have heard from several people that the book is at least as difficult to understand as the film, and what's more, doesn't guarantee at all that the film will be easier to understand then.
Well shoot me for trampling on the impressive achievement that a lot of people seem to think this film is. But as I said, I judge a film by the end results; a film is a viewing experience, intended for viewers; to be viewed, and I suppose also understood by them to a certain point, although apparently I might be mistaken on that last bit. Anyway that's just my opinion, and in the light of the above I really can't give this film more than a 4 out of 10.
If this review makes the blood boil (or worse) of people who loved this film than so be it, but I hope my review will at least serve to warn some other like-minded film viewers before going to see this, just so you know what to expect...