Monday, August 12, 2013
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Monday, August 5, 2013
The Finest TV Production Ever, Now on Blu-ray
"Smiley's People is simply the finest TV production ever"
Smiley's People (1982) is finally out on Blu-ray, from Acorn home video.
Often viewed as the lesser of the two BBC six-hour-mini-series
adaptations of John LeCarre's masterworks of Cold-War espionage... this view must now be reconsidered, as George Smiley might say.
Everything's better in Blu-ray.
Smiley's People leaps to vivid life in HD.
Never have an actor and role been better matched than Alec Guinness as George Smiley.
Never.
Author LeCarre famously said that Guinness's portrayal in the first mini-series, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1979) influenced how he wrote the Smiley character afterward.
We can't imagine it being otherwise.
(Both Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Smiley's People were MIA from U.S. home video for way too long... about 20 years or longer. Those who remembered the series fondly just waited and waited. Both are now finally out in HD, both from Acorn.)
Having just finished the new Blu-ray, we'd say that Smiley's People is simply the finest TV production ever.
Better, even, than the great Tinker, Tailor.
A bigger budget, due to the success of Tinker, Tailor, brought this production (quite lavishly for British TV) to Paris, Hamburg and Bern, Switzerland. The effort was not wasted. The locations are used beautifully.
Everyone is superb.
Guinness, of course, is absolute perfection.
Bernard Hepton as cagey operational-expert and dubious-art-dealer Toby Esterhase is just as good. Do not take your eyes off him.
Smiley's People has many fleeting moments of sly humor.
Frau Kretcszhmar, the wife of the good-guy-Hamburg-sex-club operator, is onscreen for seconds but is hilariously unforgettable. Esterhase has some great funny moments as well, and even Smiley has a few.
A rich, deep production of a rich, deep story.
Now, of course, HD in this instance is a relative thing.
That said, if you love this production it is worth purchasing on Blu-ray, even if you own the DVD set.
The Blu-ray is a major image-quality upgrade. Sharper, clearer, less artifacts. We know, because we A-B compared the two.
However, the show is 30+ years old. It has not been restored, but simply transferred from a decent source (likely a film print as was the case for the Blu-ray of Tinker, Tailor. Shockingly, the BBC did not know where the negative of Tinker, Tailor was, and had no interest in looking, the cinematographer told us.)
Both landmark series were shot on standard 16mm film, the custom for British filmed TV until Super 16 and later the digital age.
It is not in widescreen.
None of this matters... in fact, the gritty, grainy, lowly, claustrophobic 4:3 16mm approach works wonderfully for the downbeat story. The sun never comes out in this tale.
A restoration would be wonderful, but don't expect it to happen.
Smiley's People on Blu-ray is not to be missed.
Thursday, August 1, 2013
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)