Spy drama based on a true story, starring Judi Dench and Sophie Cookson. When senior citizen Joan Stanley is arrested under suspicion of spying for the KGB decades beforehand, the charge seems contrary to her past as a young woman studying physics at Cambridge University. In the 1930s, she became involved with radical politics, and the 40s saw Joan being tasked with working on Britain's atomic programme - until the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki forced her to take a moral stand.
Judi Dench is well cast in this otherwise drab melodrama "inspired" by the story of real-life British KGB agent Melita Norwood. She's remodelled here as Joan Stanley, a Cambridge physics student who falls for a sexy communist in 1938 and feeds him top-secret atomic information because she wants all nations to be on a level playing field as regards nuclear power. Arrested for treason as a pensioner, Joan tells her cliché-ridden story to the interrogating MI5 authorities via plodding flashback. Dench invests her all into the role, and Sophie Cookson capably plays her in flashback, but it's all rather drearily directed by Trevor Nunn. With the end a foregone conclusion, there's little urgency or suspense to the film.
| role | name |
|---|---|
| Joan Stanley | Judi Dench |
| Young Joan | Sophie Cookson |
| Max | Stephen Campbell Moore |
| Leo | Tom Hughes |
| Nick | Ben Miles |
| Sonya | Tereza Srbová |
| Patrick Adams | Laurence Spellman |
| Clement Attlee | Robin Soans |
| role | name |
|---|---|
| Director | Trevor Nunn |
