I know it’s Oscar time 2011 and everyone is focused on The King’s Speech, True Grit, 127 Hours, etc. and I know it’s not right to start looking ahead to next year, but I’m setting my sights on what’s coming out in 2011/2012 that should get Oscar nominations for 2012. To start it off….put this on your calendar. Fall 2011. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

John le Carre’s brilliant novel, set in the Cold War, has espionage veteran George Smiley forced from semi-retirement to uncover a Soviet agent within MI6’s echelons. The original 1979 BBC television mini-series of the same name, starring Sir Alec Guinness as George Smiley, was brilliant. No reason for a remake.

This may…just may…cause me to alter my feelings about  a remake. In what has to be one of the most impressive cast lists assembled in some time, TTSP starring the likes of Tom Hardy (Inception), Colin Firth (The King’s Speech), Gary Oldman (Dark Knight, Harry Potter), Ralph Fiennes (Schindler’s List, The English Patient, Harry Potter) and Benedict Cumberbatch (Atonement, Sherlock, Small Island, Hawking). Directed by Tomas Alfredson, the film also stars a name quite familiar to British comedy aficionados, Roger Lloyd Pack (Only Fools and Horses, Vicar of Dibley, The Old Guys). Screenplay was written by Peter Straughan who also wrote the screenplay for The Men Who Stare at Goats, the Ewan McGregor, George Clooney, Kevin Spacey film that defied pretty much all logic from what I could tell after seeing last year.

Though the film is currently in post-production, there is still some conflicting reports as to whether or not this will be released in September 2011 or early 2012, but in either case, definitely seems to be one that is well worth waiting for.