Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

I wrote a few months ago that I had heard that John Le Carre's classic 1974 book had been converted into a film, this thirty years after the BBC made a seven part television series. I had the pleasure of watching the film yesterday; I'm not sure of my response.

The book shown on the left of course is not the same as my copy, but rather a new printing which ties in with the film - that's Gary Oldman as George Smiley on the cover. I think that Sir Alec Guiness made a better Smiley.

I think that I know the book so well that I am unable to appreciate someone else's version of the story. Instead I nitpick:

• Operation Testify now takes place in Budapest, Hungary instead of Brno, Czechoslovakia (as it was then) - because it was 20% cheaper to film there! The book version of Testify is completely different to the filmed version, which actually begins with this. Whilst this is chronologically correct, the operation is revealed only about two thirds of the way during the book, in order to maintain the reader's curiosity (and also because George Smiley has to find out on his own what happened).
• Some of the scenes with Jim Prideaux and the boarding school are shown (doesn't Bill Roach look like Peter Griffin from 'Family Guy'!) but appear in the wrong place as per the book. The episode where Jim Prideaux strangles the owl (or whatever it was that flew out of the fireplace) is shown but misses its resolution: the whole point of this was to hint at who killed Bill Haydon at the end (his neck was broken, where in the film he is shown being shot). This is called foreshadowing and is an example of the Chekhov's gun trope. The film bungles this.
• George Smiley's house has moved inexplicably from Chelsea to Islington, and Ricki Tarr has his adventure in Turkey as opposed to Hong Kong (Portugal in the BBC version). Budgeting again? 
• Someone got confused between Sam Collins and Jerry Westerby: Sam's lines were spoken by Westerby! So why was the character not called Collins?
• Smiley's hotel has moved from near Paddington to near Liverpool Street.
• Russian spy Poliakov was only a veiled threat during the book, where he appeared in one scene at the end; in the film we see him frequently.
• Whilst Irina was shipped off from Hong Kong by plane, here she is shipped off (literally); that's understandable if her part of the action took place in Istanbul. But why on earth was she presented during Jim Prideaux's interrogation? There was no way that Prideaux could or should have known who she was. And as for her demise ... the one truly shocking moment of the film ("I didn't see that one coming" - Austin Powers).

The casting was also slightly strange: in my humble opinion, Cieran Hinds (Roy Bland) would have been much more successful as Sir Percy Alleline than Toby Jones was; Hinds had the height of the fictional Alleline and was much more threatening. Colin Firth was wasted as Bill Haydon; his charisma was never shone (Firth hardly spoke) and one never got the sense that everyone knew it was him but was afraid of saying so (although this is mentioned right at the end). As for the characterisation of Toby Esterhase, the less said, the better.

I can't say whether the story as presented makes much sense. So much seems to be a fait accompli, Witchcraft is presented at the beginning and Smiley doesn't have to ferret out the truth.

It's ironic that Irina was shipped back to Russia from Istanbul. The general story of Bill Haydon was based on that of Kim Philby; John Le Carré himself (under his born name of David Cornwell) was one of the spies blown by Philby. Philby himself was nearly blown by the attempted defection of a Russian spy called Volkov; the telegram offering his services (like Tarr's telegram) ended up on Philby's desk, who was able to arrange the capture of Volkov. Volkov was then invalided out of Istanbul onto a Russian ship, like Irina.