I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Sadly Over-hyped

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Keeps you wanting to know what happens next. I'm old enough to be a sucker for these cynical, disillusioned, negative stories, with neither bad nor good guys, just individual flies caught in inextricable webs, born into inescapable circumstances. It's particularly obvious that the people in this movie are not in control of their fates, though Mr and Mrs Dobbs survive. Free will is an illusion. The saddest victim appears to be Mrs Elsa Fennan, and it seems unjust that she has been chosen to suffer the most.The title of this film is curious. What, or whose, affair is being referred to ? Does this title hide multiple meanings ? There seems to be a subtext of deviant sex relationships adding tension to the ostensible spy story. One reviewer suggests that the reason Mrs Dobbs is a nymphomaniac is because Dobbs is impotent. He certainly appears to lack power, although he benefits greatly from the plaster cast covering his hand and arm in the slightly unsatisfactory finale. Roy Kinnear has a very unusual relationship with his little daughter's two mothers. Another suggestion is that there is a gay undercurrent to the story. Why is the pansified adviser called Marlene Dietrich ? Why does the bureaucrat played by Haigh initially call others "darling" ? What was the prior connection between Mason and Schell ? People get murdered fairly easily in this movie. It's definitely deadly The final scene is unsatisfactory since there seems to be no good reason why Schell fails to shoot Mason, when he has the opportunity. He was ready enough to murder Elsa Fennan when he felt it would do him some good. However, his inability to shoot Mason doesn't really spoil the picture, which remains intriguing, all the way. Great use is made of Edward II, and the manner of his elimination, which reportedly involved a red-hot poker.

Being one of the less familiar entries in the Lumet canon, The Deadly Affair is a superior John Le Carré spy cold war drama, based on his first published novel "Call for the Dead". The author's ability to infuse his characters with the necessary humanity, the flaws and melancholy of living in a world rapidly evolving beyond their control always does it for me and the same happens here. Mr. Lumet captures cold war London, describes the routine of decidedly unglamorous government agents (think 007 in reverse), tormented by nymphomaniac wives, sleepiness (…) and, typical of Le Carre, confronted with the emotional frustration of questioning old friendships. Few abrupt "Roeg-ish" cuttings aside, this one gains from its splendid Freddie Young photography, the exceptional production design and the jazzy Quincy Jones soundtrack. Performances vary from the (usual) delight in watching Mason, to the magnetic (Signoret) and the downright awkward – Ms. Andersson (Bergman's one time muse) may be a wisely twisted choice but acts unconvincingly hysterical. Genre fans expected.

Good to great actors...but...YAWN~ I had DVR-d this and wound it back to try & get "into" the story...i.e. get hooked enough to WANT to finish it! The dreary late 1960s movie . where ALL is doubted and ALL the world is just one sour lemon...means that you get the jazzy music whenever Mason's character will have that dreary "I love you, wife, but why are you sleeping with everyone" talk.And no one really believes in anything...Mason and another great actor Maximillian Schell - long for the good old days of World War 2 when the issues (i.e. the "good vs bad") seemed clear...So why should we care if someone is spying on someone else??? If you're gonna do nihilism---make it INTERESTING---not dreary!Deleted it without bothering to rewind & review the ending. I just didn't care!!!(And I liked some other Sidney Lumet films...as well as many of these actors....But this one's a dud!)

The Deadly Affair was the top half of a double bill on TVO, with The Spy Who Came In From the Cold, and I enjoyed it much more than the drab, monotonous Richard Burton vehicle. Sidney Lumet gathered the best English actors--Mason, Harry Andrews, Kenneth Haigh (who originated Jimmy Porter on stage), Roy Kinnear, Max Adrian, and many more, adding to them Simone Signoret, Maximilian Schell and Harriet Andersson: what a star-studded cast. Lumet keeps the action flowing adroitly; he brings the Harriet Andersson character into the story, rather than showing her in flashback as le Carré had done in the novel.All in all, it's a solid piece of entertainment. If you are a fan of Harry Andrews, as I am, you will relish the way he makes the retired policeman Mendel his own. The narcolepsy, the scene with the rabbit, the bar scene with Roy Kinnear, they are all wonderfully played. I could say that Mason is Andrews's foil, rather than the other way around. Simone Signoret is the wrong physical type for Elsa, but she manages to bring some real venom to her dialogues with Mason.