Original subtitles

DOG BARKS

BARKING IN DISTANCE

DISTANT GERMAN OVER LOUDSPEAKER

HORN HOOTING

'Sofern nicht anders angegeben, bleiben sie in ihrem fahrzeug.

'Halten sie alle papiere fur den unterricht bereit.'

'Sofern nicht anders angegeben, bleiben sie in ihrem fahrzeug.'

JINGLE BELLS IN GERMAN OVER SPEAKER

'Sir Roger!'

In the interest of discretion,

I thought it best to drop by in person.

At one o'clock in the morning?

The minister was at the opera...

..which meant we had to wait to get his signature.

Gotterdammerung?

Beg your pardon?

Wagner. Opera joke. Never mind.

Thank you, no.

Where have you been tonight?

Saying goodbye to a friend. Anyone I know?

Jim Angleton.

On his way home to Washington as we speak.

When did you last see Tony Blunt?

Sure I can't tempt you? Quite sure.

Sir Anthony and I, as I suspect you well know,

had lunch the other day at my club.

Why? You haven't gone and lost him, have you?

I should never have agreed to let you go to Beirut.

KNOCKING

Sounds like one of yours.

Don't tell me, panic over - Blunt's resurfaced.

Nine o'clock sharp. My office.

Don't be late.

DOOR CLOSES

I... just lost my footing.

Questions are being asked, Kim.

I slipped on the ice, for God's sake! People are worried about you!

On my way to the Metropol. I was hoping to find you or Burgess...

preferably you.

A friendly face. Some music. A little fucking colour.

Which reminds me...

..Burgess sent a peace offering.

From his personal library, he wanted me to tell you.

Clever bastard.

Do you know this one?

Takes place in London in 1934...

when no-one yet knew what they stood for.

Also some tinned fruit, a jar of marmalade,

cigarettes and a couple of other bits and bobs.

All from Guy?

The marmalade's from me - Fortnum and Mason's via diplomatic pouch.

Ooh, speaking of which, pass my coat.

I have a letter I need you to send.

To whom? Oh.

Oh, damn, it's gone.

I couldn't trouble you to rustle up some paper and an envelope?

Paper and envelope.

Er...

Medsestra! Medsestra!

Good morning, sir.

Mr Elliott.

Have a seat.

Mrs Thomas here is of the opinion that... Philby told you

Tony Blunt was also a Russian double agent.

She's right. He did.

And that that's the reason you let him go?

Something tells me Mrs Thomas is quite a bit cleverer than that.

When did he give you Blunt?

The last day.

Out on the balcony? Yes.

Where no-one could hear you?

I'll have to take your word for that.

Why haven't you disclosed any of this until now?

I'd just learned that the man I trusted most in the Service

and my best friend was a Russian spy.

You could say I'm not quite sure who to trust any more.

You understand that any information acquired in Beirut from Philby

is considered counter-intelligence...

which is now the domain of MI5?

What I understand is that this is a show for the minister.

A pissing contest between MI5 and SIS.

No contest, I'm afraid, thanks to Philby.

Exactly. I thought you were off the case.

KNOCK Number 10 on the line, sir.

Concerning?

Profumo.

Educated guess.

If you wouldn't mind waiting in the ante room for a few minutes,

I'm sure Miss Harbinson will be happy to find you some refreshment.

Not you, Mrs Thomas.

You stay where you are.

I don't know about this, Kim.

It's a personal letter, it's nothing more...

..separating friendship from politics.

Which there was no time for in Beirut?

SIGHS

I'm tired, Donald.

So fucking... fucking tired.

I didn't seal the envelope.

Read it if you want. Run it by your KGB chums if you must.

They're your chums, too.

Well, then there shouldn't be a problem, should there?

The cricket starts today. England and Australia.

I was rather hoping to catch some of that on the wireless later.

Ah, well, we should get on with it, then.

Their fast bowlers should be quite a handful.

But I think our batsmen will be up to it this time.

Dinner's at eight, by the way.

You haven't forgotten?

Do you think you could do that upstairs?

RINGING

Jane.

You look... Well...

Well, I must admit, all things considered,

I actually feel quite chipper.

No, I meant comma, well, dot, dot, dot, how do I put it?

BUZZER You can go in now.

How's your head, by the way?

Oh, it's still there. By a thread.

So...

..last night... at the St Georges...

You went to the St Georges... without me?

Fuck off, Kim.

Wait... Now I'm lost... Are you telling me I was there?

At the bar? The pool.

Ah. Golly.

Well... that explains this, then.

Do you think I might have a glass of water?

More?

Right.

So, here's the scoop...

..but first, you owe me a proper drink.

It all began in... Vienna.

In '34?

February... 1934.

Not before then, up at Cambridge?

Cambridge? Oh, no.

Cambridge is where you fantasise about what you stand against...

..whereas, Vienna...

..that was where I quickly learned what I stood for.

Who recruited you?

No-one.

I fell in love.

'You fell in love?'

ACCORDION MUSIC

MUSIC DROWNS OUT SPEECH

Stop it there, please.

Which one of you opened the window? Him.

Though you must've known that would interfere

with the listening equipment?

I suppose I assumed whoever selected the safe house and bugged it

would've taken an open window into account

in the Mediterranean climate.

What utter nonsense, Nick.

It's 1963, I don't think it's too much to ask!

It's the debriefer's job to control the damned environment!

You had to have known opening a window could be a tactic.

I viewed it more in psychological terms.

It told me that he was on the brink of capitulating

but needed to create a sense of privacy

before baring his soul, so to speak.

The tape is supposed to be evidence.

I didn't go to Beirut to solve a crime. I knew he was guilty.

We all knew he was guilty.

I'm a spy, not a policeman. It's interesting.

You almost sounded vindicated just then.

Like a man who'd succeeded in what he went out there to accomplish.

If he succeeded, then it'd be Philby sitting here now

and the Russians would be none the wiser.

So from this point on, we're supposed to rely on your account

of what happened in that flat.

Do you honestly mean to tell me

MI5 doesn't have the wherewithal to enhance the tape?

There is, of course... another way to think about all this...

which is that the three minutes

you and Philby spent on that balcony is in fact a distraction.

A piece of misdirection...

because I have to say, three minutes does seem like a very short time,

indeed, the end of such a long friendship,

in which to... bare one's soul...

..leaving me to consider the possibility that

the real truth about why you let Philby go isn't even on the tape.

Thoughts, Mrs Thomas?

You fell in love?

SNIGGERS

Oh, come on, you've gotta laugh.

Everything you need to know is in there.

Perhaps you'll now allow me to go home and listen to the cricket.

Is this it? Where's the rest of it?

Names, dates, operations...

That's all there is. That's all I know.

A list of your Soviet handlers from the '30s.

Are any of these people still active or even alive?

It says here you severed all contact with Soviet Intelligence

right at the end of the war, in 1945,

"having seen the error of my ways".

Which you've said yourself.

Come here.

Your funeral.

What's the Russian for cheese?

I don't know.

Say it in English, then.

Are you trying to get me killed?

Now, there's a thought.

You don't really mean that.

Give me one good reason why not, Kim,

and it better be a fucking good one.

Tell me you understand why I said you severed all contact

with the KGB in 1945.

The benefit of the Americans...

to protect our relationship with them.

I don't give a toss about the special relationship. Try again.

You said it to protect me.

To protect you.

Because as we both know, you've been very busy for the KGB

until right fucking now.

Am I correct in saying your operating thesis with Philby was

that friendship trumps ideology?

Even though men like Philby put ideology above all else?

What other men like Philby do you know?

If I may, ma'am,

I think it'd be a mistake to see Philby as purely ideological.

He just defected to the Soviet Union!

She's right. A spy is an adventurer, an opportunist...

An elitist. And to work for the KGB from within SIS

put Philby in an even more elite group.

Burgess, Maclean, Philby, Blunt...

Four men.

Are you implying there are more?

Aren't we all?

You admit to tipping off Burgess and Maclean in '51.

Out of loyalty to my friends.

Who's your handler?

I don't have one.

How could I if I broke contact with the KGB?

ACCORDION PLAYS OUTSIDE

Please tell me you're not paying that bugger to play all day.

SIGHS He is rather good, though, isn't he?

Take a butcher's at that.

Confirm which of these men is working for the Russians

and I'll know you're taking this seriously.

A test. I know. The temerity of it.

You're fishing.

Take it away with you and give it to me at dinner tonight.

I take it I'm still invited?

Tim Milne? You've been a friend of his for years.

Well, surely by that logic,

your name should be at the top of this list.

See you at eight.

Are you all right? Never better.

Were you fishing? Yes.

Who was on that list?

Friends and associates of Burgess, Maclean and Philby.

Specifically. Why does it matter?

I've already told you I was bluffing. Humour us.

Tim Milne...

..John Cairncross, Tony Blunt,

Guy Liddell, and one or two others I might be forgetting.

Blunt was on the list?

Thanks to his close friendship with Guy Burgess,

dating back to their Cambridge days.

Earlier... you said Philby gave you Blunt

when you were out on the balcony... unless I'm missing something.

So if he'd already given you Blunt...

why then go through all the rigmarole with the list of names?

Surely you already had your man.

I was worried Blunt was chickenfeed.

And then that same evening, you went to dinner at the Philbys'.

Yes. Why?

Certain friends of ours had got wind that I was in Beirut.

American friends? Among others.

Of Philby's American wife. And if I didn't go to dinner,

then it might've tipped them off that something was amiss.

That's it? That's the only reason you went? That's it.

It's also the reason why you let Philby go home that afternoon.

Correct.

Boy, are you on my shit list.

Three days you've been in town and not a peep! Give me those.

Something smells delicious.

That'll be me. JAZZ MUSIC

MUSIC STOPS Bravo.

APPLAUSE Jolly good.

Ah! Here he is.

Good Lord, look what the cat dragged in!

Kim was just regaling us with some of your dirty limericks.

Oh, good Lord, I hope not.

Hello, there. Senorita from Pisa.

I sleep-a with whomever I please-a.

How's the rest of it go?

Ah, no clue. That one was Kim's.

I was merely an innocent bystander.

The laughs we've had, eh, Nick? Eh? Right.

Ah, what about this? You'll remember this one.

Ah, Elliott, just the fellow.

Sit down, I'd like a frank word with you.

I'm not sure now's the right time...

Does your wife know what you do?

Kim, darling, everyone's already heard that God knows how many...

Darling, please! If you don't mind. Come on, for old times' sake.

This actually happened to him, verbatim, right?

Right. Ready?

Does your wife know what you do?

Yes. How-How did that come about?

Well, she was my secretary for a couple of years,

and I think the penny must have dropped.

Ah, quite so. Quite. And what about your mother?

She thinks I'm in something called SIS,

which she believes stands for Secret Intelligence Service.

Good God! How-How-How did she come to know that?

A member of the war cabinet told her at a cocktail party.

POLITE LAUGHTER

Dinner is served. A table, everyone.

You forgot this earlier.

CHATTERING

Nicholas, will we have you here, please? Oh, lovely. Thank you.

De Gaulle may be French, but he ain't no dummy.

He knows where your loyalties lie.

Oh, do tell, I so love a lecture.

The Brits care about two things and two things only,

neither one of which is goddamn Europe.

Bangers and mash.

The monarchy. And America. The monarchy and America.

Where are you going, darling?

Do you wanna know something funny?

Windsor isn't even the royal family's real name.

They changed it from Witten to Windsor.

The Wittens of Saxe-Coburg and... something or other...

Gotha Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

They're bloody krauts, for pity's sake!

And did you also know... that Anthony Blunt... Kim.

..Sir Anthony Blunt, I should say, a cousin of the Queen's...

Distant cousin by marriage.

Did you know that MI5 sent him on a secret trip to Berlin

right after the war

to recover some rather compromising correspondence

from certain members of the royal family

to certain members of the Third Reich, including Hitler himself?

Isn't that right, Nick?

And now Germany is the front line of the Cold War,

and the Wittens of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha are now the...

HIS VOICE FADES

..under the aegis of the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

I'm not sure I completely follow!

But that's not bad for... how much have you had to drink?

Dear old England, however, with an ever watchful eye

on which side her bread is buttered,

has been grooming a new patron to serve.

To, to appease.

To... Rrrrr! ..fellate.

Oh, good Lord! Kim, is that really necessary?

That's right, you guessed it... Old donkey dick herself.

The United States of America.

What about Russia?

Where do they fit in all of this?

Please don't encourage him, Nick.

He's not trying to encourage me, darling.

He's trying to shut me up.

You see, my best friend here...

..has been sent all the way from London...

..to do what, exactly, Nick?

Check your liver. LAUGHTER

Old donkey dick herself!

I gotta write that one down.

I need some fucking air.

Oh, air, my ass!

That's some classic Brit spy bullshit if ever I saw it.

Oh, do please fuck off, Miles.

You know, the only thing worse than...

simple-minded and pompous is...

Now, Kim, come on, we're all friends here!

..simple-minded, pompous and American...

Come on, come on, let's get you some of that fresh air.

Kim.

Right. Come on.

Left-hand drawer of the desk.

And that was it.

He rejoined the others, and I left the party to go

and file my report at the consulate.

That's the last you saw of him?

Yes.

Mr Elliott and I are going to go and stretch our legs for a while.

We'll reconvene back here after lunch.

'Mr Director, gentlemen...

'You've all heard me preach for years now,

'how the Russians are far more sophisticated

'and strategic than we give them credit for.'

So now that my longheld suspicions

about Harold Adrian Russell Kim Philby have been confirmed,

a man who rose... almost to the very top

of Great Britain's Secret Intelligence Services...

..we are duty-bound to recognise that the patience and the discipline

of the Russian intelligence services

are never again to be under-estimated.

But...

..if at times, we have lacked the resolve

and the imagination to counter that threat...

Thank you.

..then our British friends, to use their term, are in,

to use our term, even deeper shit.

And we must now face the fact that if they have been penetrated

to the level that Kim Philby achieved over the course

of a quarter of a fucking century...

..then not only are there other Communist agents

among the senior ranks of their national security apparatus...

..but more importantly...

we too at the CIA... have also been penetrated.

Watch out.

People and their bloody animals.

Blunt came to me.

At the end of last week.

You don't seem that surprised.

Shrewd customer, is Sir Anthony.

He claims to have only worked for Russian intelligence

when we were allies during the war.

That old chestnut.

So the reason he decided to come to me now...

is so I can be best positioned to protect Her Majesty.

To hush it up, you mean?

Then... this morning...

..he telephones... in a terrible state...

to inform me that Mr Angleton... attempted to interrogate him

at some... CIA safe house in Buckinghamshire.

Which you managed to stop...

..before any more damage could be done.

Well, maybe the Queen'll give me a knighthood one day.

Does Moscow know Tony's blown?

Rise, Sir Nicholas.

We have to assume... Philby's told the KGB about that.

Oh, I highly doubt that.

If the KGB were ever to discover that he gave me Blunt, he's dead.

Perhaps we should consider leaking it, then.

What day is it today?

Friday. You a steak and kidney pie man, Sir Roger?

What difference do you think... men like Philby and Elliott...

and the games they play... actually make in the world?

You mean like the one you and Elliott are now playing

against Sir Roger?

LIFT DOORS OPEN

Hello, Jim. How are you? Richard.

How long, would you say, did you suspect Kim Philby?

Was there a specific moment or incident

that... opened your eyes?

It was cumulative.

Behavioural.

I've never known a man want so desperately to be my friend.

But you were never fooled by him?

If I was fooled by anything,

it was by my faith in our British friends...

..whom I didn't believe would ever let him slip through their fingers.

Are you referring to anyone in particular, Jim?

I'm referring to an entire goddamn class of Englishmen.

At the risk of sounding like a Communist yourself.

CHUCKLES

So...

..who else did he give you?

Philby.

Because the other thing that didn't come back from Beirut

was that list of names.

Right now... probably as we speak...

..Jim Angleton is back at the CIA,

getting ready to tear the place apart...

..in search for traitors,

due to implications, insinuations and outright disinformation

that Philby has been planting in his brain

for the last quarter of a century.

So when you ask... who else he gave me,

I think the question that it's important that we... you and I...

first ask ourselves is this...

..are we here in London...

ready to withstand such a level of witch hunt...

and take on those kind of casualties?

Because, thanks to Philby... who among us is now safe?

Which is why, if you'll allow me to blow my trumpet

briefly for a second...

I was precisely the right person to go to Beirut.

Because had it been anybody else, who didn't know Philby as I do...

..there's no telling who they'd be accusing next.

Shall we?

CHATTERING

Any other questions, Jane?

Mrs Thomas?

No, sir.

You may fool others, but you can't pull the wool over these eyes.

You want to know what he once told me about you?

He said that at any given moment,

you're far more switched on than you let on.

Which is what makes you so dangerous.

Tell me you'll make something of all this...

..that in the end, you were in fact always one step ahead of him.

HORN HOOTS

DOOR OPENS

LAUGHTER

CHATTERING

Read this.

When did you get... Just read it.

"Dear Nick, I wonder..." To yourself.

"Dear Nick, I wonder if this letter will surprise you.

"Our last transactions were so strange,

"I can't help thinking that perhaps you wanted me to do a fade..."

As a matter of interest, why would you show me this?

"It is invariably with pleasure

"that I remember our meetings and talks.

"I've often thought that there are a number of questions

"connected with the whole story that might interest you,

"and it might be... helpful all around

"if we could get together to discuss matters of mutual interest...

"..to give ourselves the chance

"to salvage a friendship from all this mess...

"because as you always said...

"the true definition of friendship is that your forgive your friends...

"..their faults."

He's asking you for a meeting.

Unteroffizier, Gefreiter.

IN GERMAN:

IN GERMAN:

You can't seriously be considering...

What exactly do you think would happen at this meeting?

What, he'd cross his heart and hope to die that Hollis is the fifth man?

Just to be crystal bloody clear,

the reason to believe that Sir Roger is innocent

is Philby is the de facto source of the information against him.

And you decided not to believe him, so what's changed?

Or maybe you think that Philby will admit that

he's secretly still one of you...

..cos he was always one of you...

..old chap.

You're your own worst enemy.

Do you know what's worse? You're my worst enemy.

You're the whole bloody country's worst enemy.

The man, he has fucking lied to you

from the first moment that he set eyes on you.

He has lied to you and he has used you.

That is all that he has ever done,

and that is all that he will ever do.

What's more, I'm not convinced that you haven't known that

for the last 23 years.

When are you gonna fucking accept that... and be honest with yourself?

Ein frischer Wodka.

MUSIC ON STEREO

I hear you're leaving MI5.

Oh, she told you, then, did she, Mrs Sissmore?

Something about you wanting to be a better wife.

Look, I... didn't let him go,

or escape... or however you put it.

What I, in fact, did was...

Ooh, I like-a the look of your salami!

Whole or sliced, sir?

ALL: What do I look-a like, a bloody money box?

LAUGHTER You forced him to run.

They'll never be able to fully trust him in Moscow.

Which will kill him.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Right!

Well, then, on that note...

Why do you think Jane Sissmore

felt it necessary to tell me you were resigning?

I dunno. Really?

SHE LAUGHS Erm...

Apparently, according to her, erm... I intrigue you.

Are you really prepared to walk away and let chaps like me

continue running things, knowing what you now know... about us all?

You seriously think someone like me

could actually change things? Things?

Chaps like you.

A woman... from Newcastle... change us?

Durham.

IN RUSSIAN:

It's these offices at the south east corner on this floor,

down that way, next to the vaults.

All the other offices are organised on separate floors...

according to areas of responsibility around the world.

The remainder of the Iron Curtain, south east Asia,

Africa, central Europe.

And this... this is you.

Oh, damn! SHE LAUGHS

You've gotta laugh.

Thank you.

MAN: A one, a two!

MUSIC: 'Boom Oo Yata-Ta-Ta Song' by Morecambe and Wise

Yata ta ta!

# Are you lonesome... # Yata ta ta!

A-boom! Yata ta ta!

SONG CONTINUES

LAUGHTER

Just-Just a minute.

Don't stop. No, no, just a minute.

A-boom! Just a minute.

I'm-I'm ya ta ta ta-ing, you see!

Oh, well, you shouldn't be!

No, I should be singing Are You Lonesome Tonight?!

Cos you've got the sideboards, you're the star!

I'm all down to here. Yeah. Yeah.

It was the start, something went wrong with the start.

I know. Sid, you start us off, will you?

Give us the one, two, then you'll be all right. Yeah. OK?

One, two.

A boom. Whoo! Yata ta ta!

# Are you lonesome tonight? # A boom. Whoo! Yata ta ta!

SONG CONTINUES

It's good, it's good.

Just a minute, Sid. Just a minute.

LAUGHTER

I'm doing the "Ooh!" now.

I've A boom. I've yata ta ta'd and I'm doing the Ooh now!

I've only got the "boom" to go! Well, yes.

But there's something wrong somewhere, isn't there?

Yes! Yes.

Oh, I know what it is!

You start us off, you count the two in...

VOICES FADE

---oOo---