'Action bureaucracy' - slow TV from a different age

[alsoknownas]

Been doing a delicious dive into some 'action bureaucracy' (can't remember who coined that phrase, I think it was someone on Urban) - gently smouldering spy procedural stuff in which people mostly sit in rooms discussing what they plan to do (and why they won't be able to do it).

Did a rewatch of Tinker, Taylor, Soldier, Spy - (1979 version), and then Smiley's People. Have some other gems lined up - Bird of Prey, Edge of Darkness, In the Secret State, etc.

Will have to give Sandbaggers another go too sometime soon.

It's daring stuff! Inching the audience along with no apologies and very little explanation. Lean-in telly before The Wire was even a baby.

I'd put Tinker, Taylor right up there with any series ever made, in terms of quality. It's so well crafted.

Here's the famous opening sequence of episode 1, so you can see if it's likely to be your cup of tea:

 

[Santino]

There's a great scene in the book The Honourable Schoolboy (which immediately follows Tinker Tailor), when they go into their archives and look through files to prove what the KGB do and do not know. Absolutely riveting.

There's also a cracking scene in one of the later Musketeer books when Colbert sorts out Louis XIV's finances.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Excellent name for it

I went through a period of going through this sort of stuff a while back. The Sandbaggers is definitely worth your time.

 

[alsoknownas]

There's a great scene in the book The Honourable Schoolboy (which immediately follows Tinker Tailor), when they go into their archives and look through files to prove what the KGB do and do not know. Absolutely riveting.

There's also a cracking scene in one of the later Musketeer books when Colbert sorts out Louis XIV's finances.

Similarly, in Smiley's People, George Smiley asks if he can have access to the old Karla files. Lacon hesitates for a moment, seemingly weighing up security clearance levels in his head, then breezily announces - 'Well I suppose so - didn't you write most of them any way?'.

 

[alsoknownas]

Excellent name for it

I went through a period of going through this sort of stuff a while back. The Sandbaggers is definitely worth your time.

Yep, it will be third time around with Sandbaggers for me. Not quite ready yet. Will be soon.

 

[killer b]

I love both the Smiley series' and thought Edge of Darkness was brilliant when I watched it last year - will follow with interest. Any of these streaming anywhere?

 

[DaveCinzano]

I love both the Smiley series' and thought Edge of Darkness was brilliant when I watched it last year - will follow with interest. Any of these streaming anywhere?

TTSS is on Britbox

 

[DaveCinzano]

I went through a period of going through this sort of stuff a while back. The Sandbaggers is definitely worth your time.

I found the BFI's ScreenOnline website a handy way of coming up with suggestions:

BFI Screenonline: Cold War Spies

BFI Screenonline: Conspiracy Drama

Introduced me to:

• The Sandbaggers
• Bird Of Prey
• The Guardians
• In The Secret State
• 1990
• Philby, Burgess And Maclean
• An Englishman Abroad
• Blunt
• An Act Of Attribution
• Reilly: Ace Of Spies

Ones I never managed to get round to/track down include:

• Nineteen-Ninety Six
• Blade On The Feather
• Traitor
• The Donati Conspiracy
• State of Emergency
• Another Country
• Hidden City

 

[alsoknownas]

What a list! Cheers DaveCinzano

 

[killer b]

1990

I started watching this a while ago and enjoyed it very much - Must get on with it sometime... there's a poor quality version of it on youtube.

 

[DaveCinzano]

I started watching this a while ago and enjoyed it very much - Must get on with it sometime... there's a poor quality version of it on youtube.

I do like it, but at times Ewar Woowar's character comes across as basically a wet dream hero fantasy for Old Holborn types

 

[killer b]

It's fairly blunt anticommunist propaganda tbf.

 

[DaveCinzano]

It's fairly blunt anticommunist propaganda tbf.

Next you'll be telling me Andrew Sachs isn't Spanish!

 

[alsoknownas]

I started watching this a while ago and enjoyed it very much - Must get on with it sometime... there's a poor quality version of it on youtube.

Annoyingly I downloaded it ages ago but seem to have lost it (this was before I got super organised with my archive). Doubly annoyingly, it's listed as a requested item on Karagarga, so if I could just track it down I could both watch it, and do request fulfils.

 

[Winot]

Next you'll be telling me Andrew Sachs isn't Spanish!

Que?

 

[alsoknownas]

I love both the Smiley series' and thought Edge of Darkness was brilliant when I watched it last year - will follow with interest. Any of these streaming anywhere?

I would have thought BFI Player would be a good source for this kind of stuff, but can't see much on there unfortunately .

 

[alsoknownas]

I've started watching Bird of Prey, which has a great cast including Richard Griffiths and Jim Broadbent looking pretty fresh-faced.

I couldn't find a source for it anywhere, so I've downloaded the YouTube rip, remastered the audio, and re-graded the image a bit. If I enjoy the first couple of episodes I'm going to do the same for the rest of the series. Tell me that isn't dedication to the genre!

 

[ska invita]

im watching tinker tailor....dvd has sat on the shelf for years but downloaded it instead...anyhow its triggered a few thoughts but in the meantime ive found this very useful - perhaps will be to others

Term	Definition[10]
Agent	An espionage agent or spy; a citizen who is recruited by a foreign government to spy on his own country. This term should not be confused with a member of an intelligence service who recruits spies; they are referred to as intelligence officers or more particularly case officers.
Babysitters	Bodyguards.
Burn	Blackmail.
Circus	The novel's name for SIS (Secret Intelligence Service), MI6, which collects foreign intelligence. "Circus" refers to the (fictional) location of its headquarters in Cambridge Circus, London.
Coat-trailing	An officer of one side acting as if he is a likely defector – drinking, complaining about his job, in the hope of attracting a recruitment offer from an enemy intelligence officer, with the object of recruiting the enemy as a double agent instead.
The Competition	MI5, the Security Service, the UK's internal counter-espionage and counter-terrorism service, which the Circus also calls "The Security Mob".
The Cousins	The US intelligence agencies in general and the CIA in particular.
Ferrets	Technicians who find and remove hidden microphones, cameras, etc.
Honey trap	A sexual blackmailing operation.
Housekeepers	The internal auditors and financial disciplinarians of the Circus.
Inquisitors	Interrogators who debrief Circus intelligence officers and defectors.
Janitors	The Circus headquarters operations staff, including those who watch doors and verify that people entering secure areas are authorised to do so.
Lamplighters	A section which provides surveillance and couriers.
Legend	A false identity
Mailfist job	An assassination operation. Mailfist might be the code word for such work or the compartmented information concerning the program that performs it.
Mole	An agent recruited long before he has access to secret material, who subsequently works his way into the target government organisation. In his foreword to the 1991 edition, le Carré discloses that he may have been under the impression "mole" was "current KGB jargon" during his brief stint as an intelligence officer but that he can no longer say for certain; it is possible he actually invented the term himself. Francis Bacon used the word "mole" in the sense of "spy" in his 1641 Historie of the Reigne of King Henry the Seventh, but le Carré was not aware of Bacon's work while writing the book – the passage was pointed out to him later by a reader.
Mothers	Secretaries and trusted typists serving the senior officers of the Circus.
Neighbours	The Soviet intelligence services, in particular the KGB and Karla's fictional "Thirteenth Directorate".
Nuts and Bolts	The engineering department who develop and manufacture espionage devices.
Pavement Artists	Members of surveillance teams who inconspicuously follow people in public.
Persil	The cleanest security category available, used of questionable foreigners, "Clean as fabric washed in Persil".
Reptile fund	A slush fund, to provide payment for covert operations. (Attributed to Otto von Bismarck[13])
Scalphunters	Handle assassination, blackmail, burglary, kidnap; the section was sidelined after Control's dismissal.
Sweat	Interrogate
Wranglers	Radio signal analysts and cryptographers; it derives from the term wrangler used of Cambridge University maths students.

 

[ska invita]

though its the character names and their relations which are giving me the biggest headache tbh

Characters[edit]

• George Smiley: Educated at Oxford, he was a senior officer in the Circus, before being eased out upon Operation Testify's failure. He is called upon to investigate the presence of a Soviet mole in the Circus.
• Percy Alleline: Chief of the Circus following Control's ousting. Alleline spent his early career in South America, northern Africa and India. He is seen to be vain and overambitious, and is despised by Control. Alleline is knighted in the course of the book in recognition of the quality of the intelligence provided by the source codenamed Merlin. A Lowland Scot, son of a Presbyterian minister, Alleline came to the Circus from a City company.[8]
• Roy Bland: Second in command of London Station to Bill Haydon. Recruited by Smiley at Oxford, he was the top specialist in Soviet satellite states and spent several years under cover as a left-wing academic in the Balkans before being instated in the Circus.
• Control: Former head of the Circus and now dead. Before the war he was a Cambridge don.
• Toby Esterhase: He is the head of the lamplighters, the section of the Circus responsible for surveillance and wiretapping. Hungarian by birth, Esterhase is an anglophile with pretensions of being a British gentleman. He was recruited by Smiley as "a starving student in Vienna".
• Peter Guillam: He is the head of the scalphunters, the section of the Circus used in operations that require physical action and/or violence, and is based out of Brixton. Son of a French businessman and an Englishwoman, he is a longtime associate of Smiley.
• Bill Haydon: Commander of London Station, he has worked with the Circus since the war. A polymath, he was recruited at Oxford where he was a close companion of Prideaux. One of Ann Smiley's cousins, he has an affair with her, and this knowledge subsequently becomes widely known. One of the four who ran the double agent codenamed Merlin.
• Oliver Lacon: A Permanent Secretary in Great Britain's Cabinet Office. Civilian overseer of the Circus. A former Cambridge rowing blue; his father "a dignitary of the Scottish church" and his mother "something noble".[9]
• Mendel: Retired former Inspector in the Special Branch, he assists Smiley during his investigation. Frequently a go-between for Smiley and other members helping him investigate.
• Jim Prideaux: His Circus codename was Jim Ellis. Raised abroad partially, he is first identified as a prospective recruit by fellow student Bill Haydon at Oxford. He was shot in Czechoslovakia during the collapse of Operation Testify. Former head of the scalphunters. Now teaches at a boys' prep school.
• Connie Sachs: Former Russia analyst for the Circus, she is forced to retire, and now runs a rooming house in Oxford. Alcoholic, but with an excellent memory. She is said to have been modelled upon Milicent Bagot.
• Miles Sercombe: The Government Minister to whom Lacon and the Circus are responsible. A distant cousin of Smiley's wife, he plays a peripheral role in Smiley's investigation. Not highly regarded.
• Ricki Tarr: A field agent who supplies information that indicates that there is most likely a Soviet mole in the Circus. He was trained by Smiley. Works for Guillam as one of the scalphunters.

 

[alsoknownas]

I've started watching Bird of Prey, which has a great cast including Richard Griffiths and Jim Broadbent looking pretty fresh-faced.

So far this is very prescient stuff (in light of the recent EncroChat stuff), with a focus on the then-emerging issues around digital networks, telephony, encryption and crime!

 

[DaveCinzano]

So far this is very prescient stuff (in light of the recent EncroChat stuff), with a focus on the then-emerging issues around digital networks, telephony, encryption and crime!

Plus Richard Griffiths does sort of look like a proto-Kim Dotcom

 

[ska invita]

It's daring stuff! Inching the audience along with no apologies and very little explanation. Lean-in telly before The Wire was even a baby.

Finished it last night...great stuff...was interesting to have a look at the trailer for the 2011 remake and how they attempted to inject 'action' and 'explanation' into what was going on - looks like sacrilege to me - cringey watching it straight off the back of the TV original.

Just wanted to share some thoughts:

I don't think I've ever seen anything on TV that shows the posh-eton/wesminster/oxbridge-UK-establishment so clearly in actual mundane action...maybe Yes Minister a bit, but thats a send up. Especially the first couple of episodes were quite shocking and even intimidating to me on that score - the way they talk and act. Really shows the tight-knit, cut from the same cloth nature of the UK ruling classes. Things have changed a bit in the 40 years since this was made, but i expect not as much as all that.

Thick of IT was the only contemporary thing i could think of that goes behind the scenes of government , but its about new labour rather than the Tory-esque establishment, and so misses a lot of the Old Order back room dynamics (not that Blair and his ilk haven't slotted in neatly to that establishment of course).

Especially now with a rampant and seemingly immovable Tory party firmly in the saddle I felt I learned more about contemporary UK politics from Tinker Tailor than from any other contemporary TV. That said I don't watch much so I might be missing out on lots - any suggestions let me know please.

I kept thinking of ex head of MI6 Richard Dearlove writing that it was inconceivable for Corbyn to become PM.

Former MI6 boss labels Jeremy Corbyn a danger to national security unfit to lead the country

The former boss of MI6 has labelled Jeremy Corbyn a danger to national security and said he is unfit to lead the country.

www.politicshome.com

...this was a shocking moment to me, as it showed clearly how established the establishment is, and how it was absolutely prepared to confidently and publicly, in a sunday paper, signal the limits of British democracy to the world.

None of this is a revelation of course, we know that's how the system works, but somehow sitting in on these meetings and quiet conversations in Tinker Tailor it really brought the whole thing alive. I'd be really interested to see something more contemporary doing similair. The fact John Le Carre was an insider makes all the difference i think - the whole thing stank of truth.

It also reminded me of a good Jermey Brett Sherlock Holmes. Looking forward to checking Smileys Peeps.

 

[alsoknownas]

I'm falling behind a bit with my action bureaucracy viewing, as the gf is over, and she's not the biggest fan. 'It's just blokes sitting in a room talking'. I guess she's kind of got a point .

 

[Idris2002]

Does Callan count as action bureaucracy? Or is there just a tad too much action?

 

[mauvais]

Time to regurgitate my Grand Unifying Theory:

Over the last couple of weeks I've been watching this and I've just got to the end of S3 (1 & 2) are on Netflix. What a show! Brilliant.

I have a theory though, that all BBC shows of the form 'something of something' are excellent:

• Line of Duty
• State of Play
• House of Cards (the original)
• Edge of Darkness
• [The] Thick of It

Prove me wrong!

Lots of 'action bureaucracy' amongst this IMO.

 

[alsoknownas]

Does Callan count as action bureaucracy? Or is there just a tad too much action?

I didn't see it growing up, but my impressions are that it shares an insider cynicism with the genre, but as you say, looks a bit heavy on the action to really fit in.

However, the inclusion of an actual foregrounded colour-coded filing system has surely got to afford it some credit.

---

The Section used a series of colour-coded files to indicate targets of different priorities (with much relevance for the title of the novel "Red File for Callan");

Red File	Dangerous targets of most urgent priority, marked for death
Yellow File	A subject under occasional surveillance
Blue File	Members of the 'wrong' party
White File	People to be put out of action by sending them into divorce courts, bankruptcy, prison or mental homes

 

[mauvais]

how established the establishment is

My kind of quality of insight, this

 

[alsoknownas]

Time to regurgitate my Grand Unifying Theory:
Lots of 'action bureaucracy' amongst this IMO.

I had missed that nuanced point (about the 'x of x') - brilliant!

 

[alsoknownas]

Anybody read The Honourable Schoolboy, which sits between Tinker, Tailor and Smiley's People in the Quest for Karla trilogy?

It's light on Smiley himself and switches focus to Jerry Westerby, who you might recall is the somewhat washed up soak who Smiley chats to in a bar as he tries to suss details towards the end of Tinker, Tailor.

It's an enjoyable stumble through Hong Kong, with Westerby as the barely-capable agent, turning the business into the personal, while hunting down dirty money linking China to Moscow.

A bit of a change of pace, and occasionally a bit colonial in its outlook, but well worth the ride.

 

[alsoknownas]

Just finished Bird of Prey, which is more than a little clunky and dated. I can't wholeheartedly recommend it.

That said, main focus Richard Griffiths is solid as the bumbling, but perceptive civil servant who just won't let irregularities lie, even as he gets deeper and deeper into the realms of murder and intrigue.

There's also a chillingly brilliant performance by Christopher Logue (the poet bloke) as the corrupt Euro MP Hugo Jardine. Nails the curdling, calculated detachment of a true misanthrope.

Also interesting is how aware the writers seem to be that the advent of widely available personal computers, added to telephone networks was likely to have a transformative and possibly sinister effect on society. At one point the characters are questioning whether people are going to have to be licensed to own one!