Reviews

All of the House MD writing is above par. When it is weak and off-track and off-character it is still engaging. This episode seemed to concentrate on the philosophy of "if the Doc is too emotionally engaged, they can't be objective in their treatment."...which is fine. But this is a fall-back position for over half of the House episodes. It seems to be beaten to death. This ep offered nothing new in the discussion and was just a vehicle for sparring between Cuddy and House. And the sub-plot of the black patient that was charging racism in the medicine that Foreman prescribed - ultimately calling Foreman an Oreo, and that white people had been lying to him for years - then House prescribing him the same medicine but telling the patient that it was the 'white' version just to get him to take it -- ridiculous beyond belief. Foreman then lands with both feet on House saying that he did lie and it was white people, blah, blah, blah. House lies to everyone to get what he wants done. There was no difference here. The writers wrote this up as though it made some sort of point. The only point they made is that they have not paid attention to their own show.

Based on the novels of the same name by Len Deighton this 13-hour mini-series aired once on PBS in the US in 1988 and I believe the same in the UK. It stars Ian Holm and I believe it is filmed story-telling at its best. The story is of British spy Bernard Samson played by Holm and it picks up while he is a desk-bound spy in London Central Intelligence assigned there five years earlier after losing his nerve in his dealings in West and East Berlin. There is a mole in London headquarters passing secrets to Moscow. Bernard must become a field agent once more and go back into East Berlin and bring out the one man who can identify the mole in London. Identifying the leak is dealt with in the first few hours of the film. The identity of the mole is a shocker and the story escalates from there into a maze of mystery, cloak and dagger, international locales and very brilliant acting by an excellent cast.

This is not a Bond flick. But the phrase "I'm not a spy but I know what I like." seems to apply. The film seems to be realistic in its portrayal of the spy world showing some ordinary office politics and the tedium of stakeouts. But if you like detail in your stories you'll find enough action to satisfy. And due to length and attention to detail it is true to the Deighton novels. It may seem like a shrug of the shoulders today as the Wall is down and Germany united. I've wondered if the Wall coming down a bare few months after airing in the US kept it from being re-aired - just a suspicion. I have heard that Deighton was unhappy with it and was able to keep it from being shown again. But the film highlights so well the sweaty paranoia of being in East Berlin when you could feel the tap on the shoulder at any time even if you were a citizen let alone a spy from the west. It captures the cold war paranoia from both sides of the wall.

(If anyone knows another time and place in the past or especially in the future that it will air please share the knowledge.) At 13 hours of viewing it is not, I admit, for the impatient. This may be a moot point because I believe it is OOP or perhaps never available other than for those foresighted enough to have taped a keeper copy at home. If there is a source for this please share the information.

Ian Holm has had a successful and varied career in both stage and screen for many years. I do not think it would be out of place, however, to say that he has received much more attention and accolades in the past several years because of certain roles he has defined or perhaps redefined (his King Lear on stage and television is one example). There are certainly people that know more about his career than I do (search the web) but for me Ian Holm was one of those actors that you knew for years before you knew his name. ("Oh, look honey. It's that.guy!") I believe it was Kenneth Branagh who described Holm's style as "Anything you can do I can do less of." But he is not minimalist. He merely (!) eliminates the superfluous in the performance. If his character called for outrageous excess I have no doubt he would supply it. But only just enough.if you see what I mean.

Highly recommend to anyone who can find a copy.