True story: I used to work in retail. The moment I knew that I know longer wanted to work in retail was during a manager's meeting where we were asked to name "a good leader". The names that ended up on the board were - Hitler, Thatcher, our regional manager (of course) and Harry Pearce. Harry Pearce being the only one of that quartet who I would want to be associated with; the only one who might approach things in a calm, tolerant, analytical way without shitting on others. Despite being a fictional character.
Such is the memory of Harry Pearce, that the character is deemed capable of anchoring a big screen version of a now defunct TV series.
You do have to wonder why this was given the green light. 'Spooks' was a well regarded and prescient show but I bet nobody has given it a second thought in the past couple of years. The ace up it's sleeve (and this is before 'Game Of Thrones' remember) was that it wasn't shy about killing off its main characters. It gave the show a genuine tension as the outcome wasn't always a given. The trouble now is that those characters that everyone remembers are no longer available for the big screen version. You're pretty much left with Harry Pearce and that tech guy.
Enter Kit Harrington to fill in those general purpose agent-we-should-care-about shoes. He's alright, I suppose, but because the character doesn't have a back story we feel connected with, it's all a bit easy not to care whether he lives or dies. We know he's just a pawn in a bigger game anyway.
It doesn't make the transition to the big screen that well. The opening sequence which involves a terrorist being liberated from Her Majesty's custody in rush hour traffic plays out exactly like the opening to your average episode of 'The Professionals' but without the excitement. There's a lot of running around car parks, and airports and looking at computer screens and that sort of thing but it never feels cinematic. It always feels like you're just watching an extended-length episode.
It's a good job then, that the plot is actually quite interesting. MI5 is humiliated and Harry disgraced by association; a deliberate act of sabotage so that Britain's secret service can be tendered out to the Americans in order to be re-organised. It's basically like what's happening to the National Health Service....but with spies.
I was bored at first but as soon as I realised that it wasn't going to be a Bond film I just rolled with it. Knowing that it wasn't going to throw exploding helicopters, burning buildings or car chases at me every five minutes made it easier to relax into and actually started to work in its favour. The tension starts to ratchet up because of decisions made and the third act is very good indeed.
Peter Firth was never a brilliant actor even n his heyday ('Joseph Andrews', 'Equus', 'Tess') and the jury is still out on Kit Harrington. Don't expect powerhouse acting from anyone except the ever wonderful Tim McInnery who just scowls everyone else off the screen. To be fair, the dialogue is pretty awful, all stuff like people saying "What happened in Berlin?" while staring intently at the camera.
It's an old school British spy thriller and a neat little time capsule capture of what Britain looks and feels like right now. It gets better as it goes along without having to huff and puff all the time and there's a good bittersweet ending in keeping with the original show.
Worth your time, but you might as well wait for it to turn up on tv.
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