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An American engineer in Istanbul, Howard Graham (Joseph Cotten), becomes the target of a Nazi assassination due to his involvement in improving the Turkish navy. With the help of police Colonel Haki (Orson Welles), Graham escapes from his hotel to board a ship to safety, leaving behind his wife (Ruth Warrick). On board, he encounters a number of passengers, including the dancer Josette Martel (Dolores del Río). However, the passenger Peter Banat (Jack Moss) is not who he appears to be. [more inside]
posted by DirtyOldTown on Feb 9, 2024 - 1 comment

After the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre, the Israeli government secretly assigns Avner Kaufman (Eric Bana) to carry out a series of strategic retaliations. With the help of a driver (Daniel Craig), a forger (Hanns Zischler), a bomb-maker (Mathieu Kassovitz) and a former soldier (Ciarán Hinds), Avner conducts a worldwide operation, targeting 11 individuals. As the assassinations pile up, Avner begins to doubt the morality of his actions. [more inside]
posted by DirtyOldTown on Feb 6, 2023 - 5 comments

At Slough House, Brexit has taken a toll. The slow horses have been pushed further into the cold, Slough House has been erased from official records, and its members are dying in unusual circumstances, at an unusual clip. No wonder Jackson Lamb’s crew is feeling paranoid. But are they actually targets? With a new populist movement taking hold of London’s streets and the old order ensuring that everything’s for sale to the highest bidder, the world’s a dangerous place for those deemed surplus. Jackson Lamb and the slow horses are in a fight for their lives as they navigate dizzying layers of lies, power, and death.
posted by The corpse in the library on Feb 14, 2021 - 5 comments

John Bachelor is the saddest kind of spy: not a joe in the field, not even a desk jockey, but a milkman—a part-time pension administrator whose main job is to check in on aging retired spies. Late in his career and having lost his wife, his house, and his savings after a series of unlucky choices, John's been living in a dead man's London apartment, hoping the bureaucracy isn't going to catch up with him and leave him homeless. But keeping a secret among spies is a fool's errand, and now John has made himself eminently blackmailable.
posted by The corpse in the library on Jan 30, 2020 - 1 comment

London, England: Slough House is where the washed-up MI5 spies go to while away what's left of their failed careers. The "slow horses," as they’re called, have all disgraced themselves in some way to get relegated here. Maybe they messed up an op badly and can't be trusted anymore. Maybe they got in the way of an ambitious colleague and had the rug yanked out from under them. Maybe they just got too dependent on the bottle—not unusual in this line of work. One thing they all have in common, though, is they all want to be back in the action. And most of them would do anything to get there─even if it means having to collaborate with one another. [more inside]
posted by The corpse in the library on Dec 6, 2019 - 11 comments

Current: A terrorist group attack and block off a section of Manhattan during the G20 Summit. Past: Alex and Ryan are recruited by the CIA and begin their espionage training at The Farm. We meet a bunch of new classmates. [more inside]
posted by numaner on Oct 8, 2016 - 0 comments

Smiley springs his trap and then goes about picking up the pieces and putting The Circus back together. Poor George! Life is such a puzzle to you, isn't it? - Lady Ann
posted by carsonb on Apr 2, 2015 - 18 comments

With a new light cast on the aftermath of Operation Testify—who told Jim Prideaux to forget it, man... forget it! and move on with his post-Circus life—George Smiley knows who in the Merlin/Witchcraft circle to approach first. But before he heads down that path, a bit of follow-up is in order with old-boy lamplighter and drunkard footie newsman Jerry Westerby. [more inside]
posted by carsonb on Mar 26, 2015 - 21 comments

George Smiley conducts two interviews, first with old hand Sam Collins, the duty officer on the night Jim Prideaux was shot, then with Prideaux himself. Between the two testimonies a clearer picture is painted of the events of that night, the fateful, failed Operation Testify, as well as its fallout.
posted by carsonb on Mar 19, 2015 - 22 comments