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A Perfect Spy [DVD] [1987] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]
 
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A Perfect Spy [DVD] [1987] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]

DVD ~ Sarah Badel
4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)

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Region 1 encoding (requires a North American or multi-region DVD player and NTSC compatible TV. More about DVD formats.)

Note: you may purchase only one copy of this product. New Region 1 DVDs are dispatched from the USA or Canada and you may be required to pay import duties and taxes on them (click here for details). Please expect a delivery time of 5-7 days.


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Product details

  • Actors: Sarah Badel, Fiona Mollison, Peter Egan, Ray McAnally, Alan Howard
  • Directors: Peter Smith
  • Writers: Arthur Hopcraft, John le Carré
  • Producers: Colin Rogers, Jonathan Powell
  • Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Colour, DVD-Video, NTSC
  • Language English
  • Region: Region 1 (US and Canada DVD formats.)
  • Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
  • Number of discs: 3
  • Classification: Unrated (US MPAA rating. See details.)
  • Studio: Acorn Media
  • DVD Release Date: 14 Mar 2006
  • Run Time: 390 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
  • ASIN: B000E1ZB9U
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 129,033 in DVD (See Bestsellers in DVD)

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Reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review
A Perfect Spy is dramatised by Arthur Hopcraft, based on John Le Carré's novel of the same name and was first broadcast on the BBC in 1987. This six-hour trawl through the life of a British agent who mysteriously disappears takes in half a century and several sumptuous locations, including Prague and Vienna. It's more than a big, fat feast of spectacularly prestigious televisual drama, however. With its recurring motifs, splendidly realised minor as well as major characters (such as Peggy Ashcroft's seaside landlady) and advanced explorations of the themes of loyalty and betrayal, it is almost Dickensian in its scope.

Peter Egan plays Magnus Pym--whose entry into the world of espionage was prompted by his involvement in the dealings of his flamboyantly unscrupulous father, Ricky (the late Ray McAnally)--is a schemer without an honest bone in his body, though he and his son seem to bond extremely well. Duplicity becomes second nature to Magnus. He betrays everyone and everything close to him: his wife, his father, his country, even the high-ranking Eastern agent whom he befriends following the war and feeds secrets to. For him, this "treachery" isn't ideological but a reflex, a means of maintain his various "selves". Hence, he is the perfect spy. If Pym's bond with his father seems inexplicably intense, perhaps it's because A Perfect Spy is largely autobiographical. Le Carré's own father was a con man, while his mother, like Magnus's, disappeared early from his life. Not quite a perfect drama but richly compelling nonetheless. --David Stubbs

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Average Customer Review
4.0 out of 5 stars (1 customer review)
 
 
 
 
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20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Great, substantial piece of TV drama, 15 Sep 2000
By P. KINCAID (Coventry United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: A Perfect Spy [VHS] [1987] (VHS Tape)
I only leave off the fifth star because this is ultimately less satisfying than the previous LeCarre adaptations by the BBC. But it is still a towering achievement, especially when compared to the glossy but hollow dramas which which we must make do with nowadays. This is a powerful tale, almost Tolstoyan in its ambition: epic and intimate, specific and universal. My only qualm is over the aging of the actors: I suppose it always difficult to cast a story which follows a set of characters over several decades, but I do not feel that they solved it very well here. Some characters seem ageless, others prematurely aged. It's a small quibble, but a quibble none the less. TV is so much better a medium than film for adaptations of demanding fiction of this type that one wonders why it hasn't been exploited more often: Grahame Greene's work, for instance, would benefit from the treatment.
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