Pierce Brosnan, having lost out to Timothy Dalton for the 007 role in The Living Daylights, had to console himself with this. It's the better movie, if that's any consolation. In it, he plays a KGB agent who's assembling an atom bomb in England, with a scheme to disgrace the United States, destroy NATO, and incidentally kill a few thousand innocents. Frederick Forsyth, who adapted the script from his own novel, tends to lay his cards on the table very grudgingly, so that it takes a while for the plot to come clear, much less build suspense. But it is directed (by John Mackenzie) and acted (by Michael Caine, Ian Richardson, Julian Glover, Ray McAnally, least of all, perhaps, Brosnan) with such a fine edge that it slices quite easily through time, anyway. And as a bonus for partisans of Her Majesty's Secret Service, we are allowed to see that notorious turncoat, Kim Philby, paid off by his Soviet benefactors with a bullet between the eyes. (1987) — Duncan Shepherd
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