Alec Guinness returns as George Smiley, a character whose ambiguous motivation, obsessiveness and sense of possessing an impenetrable secret, brought many to note the similarities with Guinness's own personality.

The bespectacled spymaster is once again called from retirement to come to the aid of the 'Circus' - and he returns with a vengeance. The murder of an emigre Soviet General, who was also a British agent, sends him digging into the past on a twisted trail across Europe that moves, inexorably, towards a final showdown with his old adversary, Karla of Moscow Centre.