Cambridge Spies re-watch, Episode 1
Dec. 30th, 2011 12:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sabotabbyI saw most of Cambridge Spies years ago, but for various reasons never caught the last episode. Thanks to internet piracy, I now have the whole series.
From what I remember of it, I am kind of surprised that it doesn’t have an enormous fandom, and I was hoping that this wasn’t because it wasn’t as good as I remembered it being. The first episode confirmed that hope—it’s just as good as I remember it being.
Brief summary for those who haven’t heard anything about it: In the 1930s, four (probably five) upper-class British Cambridge students were recruited by the Soviet Union to spy on the UK, and would have gotten away with it were it not for those meddling kids. What am I saying? They got away with it until the 50s and then defected to the Soviet Union. Yes, this is a real thing that happened. No, John LeCarré is not exaggerating in his books, or at least, not very much. They included Kim Philby, a high-ranking member of British intelligence, Guy Burgess, secretary to the British Foreign Minister of State, Anthony Blunt, art historian, professor, and knight until they found out about the spying thing, and Donald Maclean, the guy who wrote that “American Pie” song. Sorry, no, not that one. This one was a member of M16.
Also, they were all smoking hot, at least if the miniseries is to be believed.
Anyway,
The first episode sets up the incredible weirdness that is Cambridge in the 1930s. I’m pretty sure I do not understand it. I’m pretty sure no matter how many British books I read and movies I watch, I will never understand the culture of academia over there.
It was even weirder in the 30s, with fascism creeping throughout Europe, the UK neutral, and the brutality of Stalin’s Russia still mostly kept quiet. The show does a great job of establishing how it was perfectly logical for idealistic, passionate, intelligent young people to hitch their wagons to the still-newish USSR. With liberal democracies turning a blind eye to genocide outside their borders and to drastic income inequalities at home, the only alternative capable of building a better world was communism.
Of course, at Cambridge, it was all incredibly abstract. While fascist sympathizers harass Jews and workers on campus, this hardly seems more dangerous than standard bullying, at least as far as anyone in charge is concerned. Philby, whose time is divided about evenly between getting attractive women into bed with him and desperately hoping that the Soviets will notice how awesome he is, proudly announces that he’s a communist to anyone who will listen. The fellows at Cambridge seem to find this endearing and quaint.
Anyway, Philby and his friend Maclean are trying to catch the eye of the Cambridge Apostles, a secret debating society rumoured to have a direct line to Moscow. They notice that one of the Apostles, Burgess, keeps checking them out, though whether it’s because he wants to recruit them or sleep with them is up for debate. Burgess is all kinds of adorable, which is unfortunate because his life story is really not a happy one. Burgess is too busy crushing on Julian Bell, another member of the group (also not a happy story there, as we’ll see in Episode 2), to want Philby for his ass—he’s just interested in his politics. The final decision, though, is up to Blunt, who is older than the others and a fellow at the university—and also Moscow’s talent-spotter.
Besides Blunt, who is slightly discreet, though only slightly, these guys all strike me as the Worst. Spies. Ever. Philby, as I’ve mentioned, goes around proclaiming that he wants to smash the system in the hopes that someone will overhear him. Maclean is distracted because his father, a Liberal politician, is dying—and really wouldn’t approve of his kid’s politics. Burgess wanders around wearing a gigantic trenchcoat regardless of weather because he likes the pockets. Which are full of booze. That he drinks all the time to cope with his gaynst. Did I mention that I love this character?
Burgess tries to organize a strike of the university waiters. It goes about as well as you might expect. The ringleader is paid off by the administration to betray his fellow workers and then get caught shagging Burgess. He’s “fired,” and there’s an incredibly heartwrenching scene where Burgess is hauled in to the dean’s office for a Serious Talk. He cops to being the real organizer—which they know, because how would a lesser being like a waiter organize a strike?—and begs them to punish him, not the waiter. They are unmoved. He tells them that a large percentage of the student body is gay, and probably about a third of the faculty, and you can tell that this is not in any way news to them. The depiction of class dynamics is really great here—they don’t care that Burgess is gay, and in fact they enjoy a spot of buggery themselves; they care that he is gay for the working class. Ultimately, he’s punished only by his own conscience.
He and Blunt do manage to convince their Soviet liaison, played hilariously by a dude in a black fedora, that Philby is worth his while. The Soviets will take Philby on under the condition that he also brings Maclean in. Which is the first time the Soviets don’t come off especially well, because Maclean just lost his father and is grief-stricken. But Burgess convinces Philby that kids are dying of hunger, dammit, and he can’t let a little moral squick get in the way of the emancipation of the entire human race. He’s—not wrong, but it’s a foreshadowing of compromises to come.
Speaking of moral squick, Blunt is shagging Bell even though he knows that Burgess is into him. What a dick.
There’s a lovely scene where they all jump naked into the river on campus, because this show is not above a little fanservice. It’s hilarious because no one seems to care or notice. They’re all like, “gay communists dropping trou and jumping into rivers, ho hum, care for a spot of tea?”
You're welcome!
Finally everyone is on board and the Soviets are sending Philby on missions. The first one is hilarious and involves some kind of mail drop, with not-at-all-obvious Soviet agents watching him the whole time. He’s so excited about the whole thing you want to hug him. The second mission is a lot more high-stakes—he has to deliver a message to someone in Vienna. They also give him a place to stay, with a girl who is “a communist, not an angel.” And is, of course, smoking hot.
I should mention that one of my two favourite exchanges happens here, between Philby, who is clearly Not Prepared, and the Soviet agent. Philby is psyched to play some anti-fascist spy games and is grateful for the chance to stick it to the Nazis. He practically blubbers all over the Soviet agent, who does not get nearly enough rations to justify babysitting this British twit, then realizes he’s being undignified and apologizes. Whereupon the Soviet agent gets an actual emotion on his face and tells him to never apologize for his convictions. It’s kind of beautiful, even in light of what happens at the end of the episode, and a reminder that there’s a human being in there.
So Philby goes off to Vienna to do the drop, and to no one’s surprise, the girl, Litzi Friedmann, is awesome. He sticks around long enough to get entangled by her plan to smuggle out a Jewish academic from Berlin. They’re caught by the Nazis and manage to make it out thanks to Philby’s British passport, but the professor and another comrade are not so lucky. He decides to marry her and bring her back to England, partially out of concern for her life, mostly because damn she’s hot.
And for a few moments, everything is great! Burgess and Blunt get a house together, Burgess seems to have a new boytoy, Philby and Litzi are totally in love, and obviously they are all happy forever and fascism is crushed, ushering in a new era of social justice and liberation.
Except the brief happiness is cockblocked by the Soviet agent, who is like, “you guys, you guys? It’s great that you’re all political and stuff, but the USSR actually has a surplus of starry-eyed idealists. What we actually need are spies. Which means the fact that you are married to a known communist is kind of a problem.”
Accordingly, Philby has to break the heart of the girl of his dreams for the sake of the revolution, and embarks upon the slippery slope of the ends not entirely justifying the means, and so forth. *sob*
I should add that while Burgess is by far my favourite character, Blunt actually gets the best line of the episode. Early on, Philby is ranting about the disgusting privilege that is Cambridge university, and he wants to tear it down, blah blah manarchistcakes, in an effort to get Blunt to notice him. Blunt replies that no, actually, he doesn’t want to tear it down, and lets it drop. Right near the end, there’s a callback, where he stands on the stairs of his beautiful new house, and tells Philby that he doesn’t want to tear the structure of privileged academia down—he wants it for everyone. It’s a lovely sentiment, and one that I think the left would do best to bear in mind when we envision a better world.
From what I remember of it, I am kind of surprised that it doesn’t have an enormous fandom, and I was hoping that this wasn’t because it wasn’t as good as I remembered it being. The first episode confirmed that hope—it’s just as good as I remember it being.
Brief summary for those who haven’t heard anything about it: In the 1930s, four (probably five) upper-class British Cambridge students were recruited by the Soviet Union to spy on the UK, and would have gotten away with it were it not for those meddling kids. What am I saying? They got away with it until the 50s and then defected to the Soviet Union. Yes, this is a real thing that happened. No, John LeCarré is not exaggerating in his books, or at least, not very much. They included Kim Philby, a high-ranking member of British intelligence, Guy Burgess, secretary to the British Foreign Minister of State, Anthony Blunt, art historian, professor, and knight until they found out about the spying thing, and Donald Maclean, the guy who wrote that “American Pie” song. Sorry, no, not that one. This one was a member of M16.
Also, they were all smoking hot, at least if the miniseries is to be believed.
Anyway,
The first episode sets up the incredible weirdness that is Cambridge in the 1930s. I’m pretty sure I do not understand it. I’m pretty sure no matter how many British books I read and movies I watch, I will never understand the culture of academia over there.
It was even weirder in the 30s, with fascism creeping throughout Europe, the UK neutral, and the brutality of Stalin’s Russia still mostly kept quiet. The show does a great job of establishing how it was perfectly logical for idealistic, passionate, intelligent young people to hitch their wagons to the still-newish USSR. With liberal democracies turning a blind eye to genocide outside their borders and to drastic income inequalities at home, the only alternative capable of building a better world was communism.
Of course, at Cambridge, it was all incredibly abstract. While fascist sympathizers harass Jews and workers on campus, this hardly seems more dangerous than standard bullying, at least as far as anyone in charge is concerned. Philby, whose time is divided about evenly between getting attractive women into bed with him and desperately hoping that the Soviets will notice how awesome he is, proudly announces that he’s a communist to anyone who will listen. The fellows at Cambridge seem to find this endearing and quaint.
Anyway, Philby and his friend Maclean are trying to catch the eye of the Cambridge Apostles, a secret debating society rumoured to have a direct line to Moscow. They notice that one of the Apostles, Burgess, keeps checking them out, though whether it’s because he wants to recruit them or sleep with them is up for debate. Burgess is all kinds of adorable, which is unfortunate because his life story is really not a happy one. Burgess is too busy crushing on Julian Bell, another member of the group (also not a happy story there, as we’ll see in Episode 2), to want Philby for his ass—he’s just interested in his politics. The final decision, though, is up to Blunt, who is older than the others and a fellow at the university—and also Moscow’s talent-spotter.
Besides Blunt, who is slightly discreet, though only slightly, these guys all strike me as the Worst. Spies. Ever. Philby, as I’ve mentioned, goes around proclaiming that he wants to smash the system in the hopes that someone will overhear him. Maclean is distracted because his father, a Liberal politician, is dying—and really wouldn’t approve of his kid’s politics. Burgess wanders around wearing a gigantic trenchcoat regardless of weather because he likes the pockets. Which are full of booze. That he drinks all the time to cope with his gaynst. Did I mention that I love this character?
Burgess tries to organize a strike of the university waiters. It goes about as well as you might expect. The ringleader is paid off by the administration to betray his fellow workers and then get caught shagging Burgess. He’s “fired,” and there’s an incredibly heartwrenching scene where Burgess is hauled in to the dean’s office for a Serious Talk. He cops to being the real organizer—which they know, because how would a lesser being like a waiter organize a strike?—and begs them to punish him, not the waiter. They are unmoved. He tells them that a large percentage of the student body is gay, and probably about a third of the faculty, and you can tell that this is not in any way news to them. The depiction of class dynamics is really great here—they don’t care that Burgess is gay, and in fact they enjoy a spot of buggery themselves; they care that he is gay for the working class. Ultimately, he’s punished only by his own conscience.
He and Blunt do manage to convince their Soviet liaison, played hilariously by a dude in a black fedora, that Philby is worth his while. The Soviets will take Philby on under the condition that he also brings Maclean in. Which is the first time the Soviets don’t come off especially well, because Maclean just lost his father and is grief-stricken. But Burgess convinces Philby that kids are dying of hunger, dammit, and he can’t let a little moral squick get in the way of the emancipation of the entire human race. He’s—not wrong, but it’s a foreshadowing of compromises to come.
Speaking of moral squick, Blunt is shagging Bell even though he knows that Burgess is into him. What a dick.
There’s a lovely scene where they all jump naked into the river on campus, because this show is not above a little fanservice. It’s hilarious because no one seems to care or notice. They’re all like, “gay communists dropping trou and jumping into rivers, ho hum, care for a spot of tea?”
You're welcome!
Finally everyone is on board and the Soviets are sending Philby on missions. The first one is hilarious and involves some kind of mail drop, with not-at-all-obvious Soviet agents watching him the whole time. He’s so excited about the whole thing you want to hug him. The second mission is a lot more high-stakes—he has to deliver a message to someone in Vienna. They also give him a place to stay, with a girl who is “a communist, not an angel.” And is, of course, smoking hot.
I should mention that one of my two favourite exchanges happens here, between Philby, who is clearly Not Prepared, and the Soviet agent. Philby is psyched to play some anti-fascist spy games and is grateful for the chance to stick it to the Nazis. He practically blubbers all over the Soviet agent, who does not get nearly enough rations to justify babysitting this British twit, then realizes he’s being undignified and apologizes. Whereupon the Soviet agent gets an actual emotion on his face and tells him to never apologize for his convictions. It’s kind of beautiful, even in light of what happens at the end of the episode, and a reminder that there’s a human being in there.
So Philby goes off to Vienna to do the drop, and to no one’s surprise, the girl, Litzi Friedmann, is awesome. He sticks around long enough to get entangled by her plan to smuggle out a Jewish academic from Berlin. They’re caught by the Nazis and manage to make it out thanks to Philby’s British passport, but the professor and another comrade are not so lucky. He decides to marry her and bring her back to England, partially out of concern for her life, mostly because damn she’s hot.
And for a few moments, everything is great! Burgess and Blunt get a house together, Burgess seems to have a new boytoy, Philby and Litzi are totally in love, and obviously they are all happy forever and fascism is crushed, ushering in a new era of social justice and liberation.
Except the brief happiness is cockblocked by the Soviet agent, who is like, “you guys, you guys? It’s great that you’re all political and stuff, but the USSR actually has a surplus of starry-eyed idealists. What we actually need are spies. Which means the fact that you are married to a known communist is kind of a problem.”
Accordingly, Philby has to break the heart of the girl of his dreams for the sake of the revolution, and embarks upon the slippery slope of the ends not entirely justifying the means, and so forth. *sob*
I should add that while Burgess is by far my favourite character, Blunt actually gets the best line of the episode. Early on, Philby is ranting about the disgusting privilege that is Cambridge university, and he wants to tear it down, blah blah manarchistcakes, in an effort to get Blunt to notice him. Blunt replies that no, actually, he doesn’t want to tear it down, and lets it drop. Right near the end, there’s a callback, where he stands on the stairs of his beautiful new house, and tells Philby that he doesn’t want to tear the structure of privileged academia down—he wants it for everyone. It’s a lovely sentiment, and one that I think the left would do best to bear in mind when we envision a better world.
