Post by Anthony on May 3, 2015 11:15:47 GMT
Games Of Thrones star Kit Harington finds his feet in an excellent spy flick based on the defunct BBC show Spooks, says Andy Lea
WE used to know what to expect when a British TV series got bumped up to the big screen.
A boosted budget would send the cast on a cushy trip abroad, while a lazy script would leave fans depressed and disappointed at their local fleapit.
The big screen spin-off from hit BBC espionage drama Spooks breaks both those rules. Apart from a brief visit to a gloomy Berlin the action takes place on the spies’ home turf in central London. And in spite of a slightly lacklustre villain I don’t think anyone will feel short-changed.
Smart, stylish, tense and reassuringly preposterous, it’s a fitting addition to the series and a rollicking spy movie in its own right.
Perhaps I should have expected the unexpected. The legacy of the show, which ran for ten series from 2002 to 2011, was to bring a new sense of unpredictably to TV drama.
After Lisa Faulkner, one of its stars, got battered to death in a deep fat fryer in Episode 2, viewers knew no character was safe.
In what is now standard practice in US shows such as Homeland and Game Of Thrones, characters would be introduced, lovingly developed then suddenly offed at irregular intervals.
A survivor and a casualty from those two shows have been added to the cast. David Harewood, who played CIA boss David Estes in Homeland, is back in the game as Warrender – a politician tasked with overhauling MI5.
While Game Of Thrones hunk Kit Harington does great work in the role of lead spy Will Holloway. In time-honoured fashion he’s quit the Secret Service after growing fed up with the working hours (still “MI5 not 9 to 5”) and the murky methods of spymaster Sir Harry Pearce (Peter Firth).
“You can do good or do well,” he says. “Sooner or later they make you choose.”
But when a terrorist mastermind somehow escapes from underneath the spooks’ noses, Will reluctantly agrees to team up again with his disgraced former boss.
Beardy terrorist Adem Qasim (Elyes Gabel) may want to blow up the Houses of Parliament but the bland jihadi doesn’t set off too many fireworks.
Instead the writers concentrate on the goings-on in MI5’s hi-tech HQ. Once again it seems like a mole is abroad so Will and Harry have to go off “The Grid” to stop this latter-day Guy Fawkes.
Fans of the show will know what this entails – illicit meetings beneath London landmarks and furtive sessions in internet cafés.
Thankfully director Bharat Nalluri doesn’t skimp on the action, even if his film owes more to John Le Carré than Jason Bourne. We get a tense scene on London Bridge, a delightfully bonkers chase at Heathrow and some thrilling action involving motorbikes in a gridlocked underpass.
The plot is deliciously twisty and, thanks to its numerous holes, almost impossible to guess. There are also some unusually weighty moral dilemmas for a glossy spy movie.
The “greater good” of the film’s title relates to Harry’s unenviable position. To him espionage is a game of chess and he needs some pawns to sacrifice before he can make his final move.
Hopefully this isn’t the end of the game for Spooks. After breaking two unwritten rules of the movie it would be great if they could break another. Could this be the fi rst British TV series to spark a hit film franchise?
WE used to know what to expect when a British TV series got bumped up to the big screen.
A boosted budget would send the cast on a cushy trip abroad, while a lazy script would leave fans depressed and disappointed at their local fleapit.
The big screen spin-off from hit BBC espionage drama Spooks breaks both those rules. Apart from a brief visit to a gloomy Berlin the action takes place on the spies’ home turf in central London. And in spite of a slightly lacklustre villain I don’t think anyone will feel short-changed.
Smart, stylish, tense and reassuringly preposterous, it’s a fitting addition to the series and a rollicking spy movie in its own right.
Perhaps I should have expected the unexpected. The legacy of the show, which ran for ten series from 2002 to 2011, was to bring a new sense of unpredictably to TV drama.
After Lisa Faulkner, one of its stars, got battered to death in a deep fat fryer in Episode 2, viewers knew no character was safe.
In what is now standard practice in US shows such as Homeland and Game Of Thrones, characters would be introduced, lovingly developed then suddenly offed at irregular intervals.
A survivor and a casualty from those two shows have been added to the cast. David Harewood, who played CIA boss David Estes in Homeland, is back in the game as Warrender – a politician tasked with overhauling MI5.
While Game Of Thrones hunk Kit Harington does great work in the role of lead spy Will Holloway. In time-honoured fashion he’s quit the Secret Service after growing fed up with the working hours (still “MI5 not 9 to 5”) and the murky methods of spymaster Sir Harry Pearce (Peter Firth).
“You can do good or do well,” he says. “Sooner or later they make you choose.”
But when a terrorist mastermind somehow escapes from underneath the spooks’ noses, Will reluctantly agrees to team up again with his disgraced former boss.
Beardy terrorist Adem Qasim (Elyes Gabel) may want to blow up the Houses of Parliament but the bland jihadi doesn’t set off too many fireworks.
Instead the writers concentrate on the goings-on in MI5’s hi-tech HQ. Once again it seems like a mole is abroad so Will and Harry have to go off “The Grid” to stop this latter-day Guy Fawkes.
Fans of the show will know what this entails – illicit meetings beneath London landmarks and furtive sessions in internet cafés.
Thankfully director Bharat Nalluri doesn’t skimp on the action, even if his film owes more to John Le Carré than Jason Bourne. We get a tense scene on London Bridge, a delightfully bonkers chase at Heathrow and some thrilling action involving motorbikes in a gridlocked underpass.
The plot is deliciously twisty and, thanks to its numerous holes, almost impossible to guess. There are also some unusually weighty moral dilemmas for a glossy spy movie.
The “greater good” of the film’s title relates to Harry’s unenviable position. To him espionage is a game of chess and he needs some pawns to sacrifice before he can make his final move.
Hopefully this isn’t the end of the game for Spooks. After breaking two unwritten rules of the movie it would be great if they could break another. Could this be the fi rst British TV series to spark a hit film franchise?