Director: Tomas Alfredson
Production Designer: Maria Djurkovic
Studio: Working Title Films
Starring: Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, Mark Strong, John Hurt & Toby Jones
Locations: London, UK, Budapest & Istanbul
Location Brief: 1960s/70s London espionage and a faded Cold War Britain

Finding the World of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

I was still in the reinstatement stage at Greenford on John Carter when a producer called me about a new film.

The project was a new film adaptation of the classic Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

One of the main briefs was to find possible multi-use sites — locations that could potentially work both for filming and as a production base.

After a few days scouting, I found a brilliant place in Mill Hill, North London.

Inglis Barracks.

It was a former military barracks with exactly the faded, institutional 1970s feel the film needed. Better still, the site was about to be redeveloped and was only available for around another eight months.

That happened to line up almost perfectly with our schedule.

There was also a modern office building on site that could work as the production office.

It was probably the best thing I could have found in one week.

The Location Behind the Locked Door

Inglis Barracks became one of those rare film locations that just kept giving.

Every time we opened another door somewhere on the site, it felt like there was another potential set hiding behind it.

Towards the end of prep, we still had one final location to find for the film’s closing dance sequence.

By then we’d searched almost everywhere at Inglis Barracks, except for one locked building where nobody could find the keys.

Eventually, they agreed I could break the lock and replace it afterwards, just so we could inspect the space.

I forced the door open, stepped inside and immediately thought:

You’ve got to be kidding me.

It was perfect.

Exactly the location we’d been searching for.

You really couldn’t make it up sometimes.

I then disappeared off on holiday with my family and, when I returned, I was officially offered the film.

Tomas Alfredson and a Very Different Kind of Spy Film

The director was Tomas Alfredson, the Swedish filmmaker who had become internationally known for the extraordinary Let the Right One In.

Hoyte van Hoytema was the cinematographer and Maria Djurkovic the production designer.

I actually wasn’t hugely familiar with Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy beforehand, so I bought the original Alec Guinness BBC series on DVD and watched the whole thing before prep began.

I loved the pace of it.

Slow.

Patient.

Atmospheric.

It trusted the audience.

I hoped Tomas would approach the film in the same way and, thankfully, he absolutely did.

It was a wonderful project creatively and really good for the brain.

I especially enjoyed working with Maria Djurkovic, who was brilliant at creating this cold, smoky, exhausted version of 1970s Britain.

The film was almost entirely UK-based, with shorter periods of filming in Budapest and Istanbul, but the London locations were crucial to building that bleak Cold War world.

Gary Oldman Swimming in Hampstead Ponds. In December.

One sequence involved Gary Oldman swimming in Hampstead Ponds.

In December.

People watching the film might assume there was some movie magic involved.

No.

He genuinely got into that freezing water.

We had mobile heated facilities and medics standing by because it was bitterly cold.

And Gary just did it.

It was genuinely impressive.

Gary Oldman, John Hurt and Tom Hardy Between Takes

The cast was extraordinary.

Gary Oldman. Colin Firth. Tom Hardy. John Hurt. Mark Strong. Toby Jones.

It became a who’s who of British acting talent.

One day we were filming near the Royal Albert Hall at the offices of Control Risks.

I was outside on the phone, sorting out an issue with a future location, when I looked up and saw Gary Oldman, John Hurt and Tom Hardy standing on the steps together during a cigarette break.

John Hurt and Tom Hardy were joking around and laughing, completely out of character.

Gary, meanwhile, seemed to remain entirely inside the world of George Smiley.

When they were called back to set, Tom and John flicked their cigarettes away and wandered back inside, still chatting.

Gary slowly finished his cigarette, carefully stubbed it out, adjusted himself slightly and then silently seemed to transform back into Smiley before walking onto set.

It was fascinating watching how differently actors approached their work.

Clearing Snow From a Film Location in Bethnal Green

One of my favourite locations in the film was a safe house near the canal in Bethnal Green.

The night before filming, heavy snow arrived unexpectedly.

We had no option but to film the following morning, so my locations team and I turned up at dawn with shovels and brushes and manually cleared the street ourselves for hours.

When you watch the finished scene, you have absolutely no idea.

Just outside either side of the camera frame were huge piles of snow.

That’s filmmaking.

Finding the Circus Headquarters in Hammersmith

The Circus headquarters was filmed at the former Post Office Savings Bank building in Hammersmith, now part of the V&A’s archive facilities.

During the scout, I took some photographs standing on top of a goods lift shaft.

Tomas immediately loved the atmosphere of the space.

It eventually became the setting for one of the film’s most memorable images — Gary Oldman standing in the lift as the doors slowly open.

For me, that’s one of the most satisfying parts of location scouting.

You stand somewhere with a camera, looking at a building or a forgotten corner of a space and wondering if there might be something there.

Months later, you’re sitting in a cinema watching that same place become part of the visual language of a film.

London Is Losing Its Period Film Locations

Looking back at the Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy location list now, one thing really strikes me.

I honestly don’t know where I would find many of those locations today.

So many have disappeared, been redeveloped or changed beyond recognition.

London is slowly losing incredible period filming locations every year.

Buildings like Inglis Barracks arrive in a very small window of opportunity. We were lucky. The site was awaiting redevelopment and we had just enough time to move a major feature film into it and use its extraordinary collection of buildings.

Eight months later, that opportunity could have been gone.

That’s the strange thing about location scouting.

Sometimes you’re not simply finding a location.

You’re photographing a version of London that is about to disappear.

One of the Finest Films I’ve Worked On

I honestly think Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy may be the most critically acclaimed film I’ve ever worked on.

Tomas did an incredible job.

I was actually surprised he didn’t go on to make many more major films afterwards. I genuinely thought after Tinker Tailor he would become one of the defining directors of his generation.

And Hoyte van Hoytema went on to shoot films including Spectre, Dunkirk and Oppenheimer, becoming one of the most respected cinematographers in the world.

You could already see it then.

He had something special.

Ironically, during one of the coldest shoots I’d ever worked on, the crew member who seemed most affected by the freezing London winter was our Swedish director.

Tomas constantly needed a heater beside him.

Which made absolutely no sense to me whatsoever.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy remains a film I am incredibly proud to have been part of.

Here are some of my original location scout photographs from the film.