Whatever others think of the superficiality of the story, I can't think of another movie that explores so provocatively the interaction of sexuality and politics/ideology. We have had stories that show characters blackmailed or led by passion to deny their beliefs, but here we have a character whose alienation from classist, homophobic, hypocritical upper-class English society in a boarding school that can't but be Eton proceeds to betray his country. Those who criticize the script seem not to appreciate the sharp critique of English society in comments like "They are not empire builders, the are empire rulers." Yes, there is snarkiness and bitchiness, but that goes with the territory, underground public-school gay underculture of the period. The film is a landmark in frankness and insight into the psychology of treason. Burgess, McLean and eventually Blount carried out the most destructive spying of the period, and they were inspired not by greed (they were after all insiders) but by principle, however mistaken that was, and as the movie shows, by social and sexual ostracism.