The Looking Glass War (1970) YIFY - Download Movie TORRENT

Reviewed by PaulusLoZebra 6 / 10

Flawed but very interesting interpretation of the novel, worth seeing

Frank Pierson made a very ambitious bet when he wrote the screenplay and directed the film version of John Le Carré's The Looking Glass War. I admire that ambition, but he only partially succeeded. The novel is a bitter, dark and gritty tale, with lots of satire, of old spymasters reliving their past glories. For that reason they are not up to the job of managing a modern and "Cold" War. Instead of "simply" telling that great and worthy story, Pierson seems to have been inspired by the Swinging 60's, with counterculture movements and young people everywhere pushing back against previous generations, to make an even bigger and more flamboyant statement of generational angst than Le Carré intended. This might have worked if executed well, but a few mistakes undercut him. He chose two beautiful, quirky, fast-rising stars, Christopher Jones and Pia Degermark as the leads. Jones' recruitment scenes were not believable, and neither was Degermark's two deus ex machina moments of entering the spy's life. But they were very nice to watch, and the very good cinematography helped, too. A few other turn-offs, for me were several tedious segments when I thought Pierson was channelling Michelangelo Antonioni, location shots that do not look like anyplace I've ever seen in Germany, as well an overly abrupt ending. In the end Pierson seems to have abandoned Le Carré's biting satire, and he jumbled the shift to generational angst.

Reviewed by Brucey_D 6 / 10

"we didn't really know him at all; a bit like a waiter in your club..."

Made in 1969 this adaptation of a Le Carré novel isn't faithful to every element of the original book, and is heavily influenced by other contemporary films.This means it isn't quite as uniformly bleak as many other Le Carré adaptations but depending on how you take it, it is perhaps hard to really believe in or sympathise with any of the characters. This is despite some pretty good performances by some of the lead actors.What is perhaps missing is the clever editing, taut direction and sheer screen presence that (say) Michael Caine brings to the Harry Palmer movies (even though the plots of those are not exactly uniformly brilliant) or Richard Burton brings to "the spy who came in from the cold". Those movies stand head and shoulders above this.Technically this film is well-photographed and the dubbing is well done too; however it is perhaps understandable if the pace of the film wanders, given that it looks a lot like they decided to shoehorn various sequences into the plot purely for stylistic reasons.Some of the criticisms in the other reviews here are spot on and others are (IMHO) thoroughly misplaced; no spoilers here so you will have to work out which for yourself. I guess it is a bit of a curate's egg, this; "good in parts". Therefore if you approach it with suitable expectations you will probably find enough things about this movie to like to make it worth watching.Overall this film probably isn't as bad as the knockers would lead you to suppose and nor is it as good as the 'ten' folk make out either. It is certainly an interesting period piece but it is also a little more than that too, so it gets 6/10 from me.

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The Looking Glass War

1970

Action / Drama / Thriller

The Looking Glass War

1970

Action / Drama / Thriller

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Flawed but very interesting interpretation of the novel, worth seeing

"we didn't really know him at all; a bit like a waiter in your club..."

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