Moscow, 1983. Wheelchair-bound Guy Bennett (modelled on homosexual British defector Guy Burgess) settles in front of a tape recorder to tell his story to a reporter from the West. What can have caused him to sell out his country? This question is a heavy load to place on a portrait of Cambridge University in the 1930s. The portrait, rendered largely in a half-light in wood-panelled rooms, is rather heavy to begin with. We are plunged without guidance or guidelines into a hierarchical system ruled by "Prefects" and "Gods" (in their patterned waistcoats), perpetuated by impenetrable tradition, and questioned only by a lone and lonely Marxist (Colin Firth). The look of the place is quite convincing, down to every last face (especially that of Rupert Everett's Guy Bennett, with his near approximation of the physical delicacy of an Aubrey Beardsley or Ronald Firbank). And we do get glimmerings of insight into the Cantabrigian lifestyle, in a voyeuristic and eavesdropping sort of way. But actual comprehension is another matter. And comprehension of the motives of treason is altogether another movie. Adapted from his own stage play by Julian Mitchell, directed by Marek Kanievska. (1984) — Duncan Shepherd