The story of Joan Stanley, who was exposed as the K.G.B.'s longest-serving British spy.The story of Joan Stanley, who was exposed as the K.G.B.'s longest-serving British spy.The story of Joan Stanley, who was exposed as the K.G.B.'s longest-serving British spy.
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Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe closing credits note the real-life Melita Norwood incident as having "inspired" the film. At the end of this movie, the reporters outside of Joan Stanley's (Dame Judi Dench's) home ask, "How much money did you get?" She answers, indignantly, "Nothing." In reality, Norwood stated, "I did what I did, not to make money, but to help prevent the defeat of a system which had at great cost given ordinary people food and fares which they could afford, a good education, and a health service." (New York Times report 13.9.99.) At that time, the U.K.'s newly elected Labour (Socialist) government under Prime Minister Clement Attlee (shown and played in this movie by Robin Soans), had introduced its first publicly (taxpayer) funded welfare state. On the first day of the new parliament, Labour members sang the socialist anthem the Red Flag.
- GoofsAt 52:37- Joan is watching a newsreel which shows the Bikini Atoll atomic bomb test. This test occurred after WW2.
- Quotes
Joan Stanley: I was fighting for the living, I loved my country!
- ConnectionsFeatures Battleship Potemkin (1925)
- SoundtracksSweet Serenade
Written and Performed by Geoffrey Peter Gascoyne
Courtesy of KPM Music
Published by EMI Production Music
Featured review
Great Acting Poor Script
Red Joan
I enjoyed the movie but it just failed to rise above its subject matter. The movie was torn between two conflicting issues that it failed to resolve
Lastly to just state this was a reflection of a true story is not sufficient to justify this rather small story of a traitor that wasn't caught until her eighties. If it had been me I would have prosecuted her and left her to rot in jail as the traitor she was and remind the viewer of the countless lives lost during the Cold War at the hands of other traitors namely Burgess and MacLaine
I enjoyed the movie but it just failed to rise above its subject matter. The movie was torn between two conflicting issues that it failed to resolve
- firstly Joan was a traitor, it cannot be for any individual to decide what a foreign country/enemy should know or not know. The movie suggests that 50 years of peace justifies her decision but this is a leap too far. Hiroshima is an example where using the bomb cost lives but saved millions of others in conventional war.
- Secondly Joan was groomed both intellectually, romantically and sexually. This was tawdry manipulation from the start and she was a naive idiot. This was revealed very early on in the movie, and yet this silly romantic thread continued.
Lastly to just state this was a reflection of a true story is not sufficient to justify this rather small story of a traitor that wasn't caught until her eighties. If it had been me I would have prosecuted her and left her to rot in jail as the traitor she was and remind the viewer of the countless lives lost during the Cold War at the hands of other traitors namely Burgess and MacLaine
helpful•163
- martimusross
- Sep 5, 2019
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Details
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $1,579,730
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $38,949
- Apr 21, 2019
- Gross worldwide
- $10,647,493
- Runtime1 hour 41 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 2.35 : 1
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