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I had a contact in Australia who someday was going to sell me a copy of Len Deighton's 'Game, Set, & Match' (BBC miniseries) on VHS for approx $200. I just never got around to closing the deal.

Too late, I find he has been terminated, sanctioned, eliminated somehow. By person or persons unknown. Whereabouts a mystery!

Therefore, I am encouraging all of you to help me find a new point-of-contact for this valuable resource. A wonderful mini-series starring Sir Ian Holm.

I must and shall have it. Appreciate any assistance you can render!

Holy crap, $200, and here I was thinking it would be readily available on DVD or for download...
If Reilly: Ace of Spies is out whats up with Game, Set, Match that it seems like a rare gem..

It is perplexing in the extreme. Somehow it fell through the cracks of modern production.

Anyway I can tell you that one of the few (maybe even the ONLY) location which used to distribute it was a website which was devoted to classic '50s/'60s 3-d movies like 'Inferno' and 'Broken Lance' or some such nonsense.

No, the BBC's 'Game, Set & Match' was obviously not a 3-D movie (and could hardly be a 3D miniseries), so I am at a loss to explain why this odd site held it available among its other treasures.

Nonetheless, if you search for 'Inferno' (Robert Ryan, Rhonda Fleming) in 3D you just may re-discover that website.

And from that point, there is where you would need to cough up the $200. Finding it at all is the foremost challenge, however.

My understanding is that Len Deighton refuses to grant permission for any further distribution of Game, Set, Match because he objects to the casting of Ian Holm as Bernard Samson. So it difficult to impossible to find a legitimate copy.

That said, there is a high quality torrent available for free if you care to search for it. I wouldn't be surprised if your Australian source was simply burning you a copy of that torrent.

What an idiot. Holm did a great job. Plus what about the efforts of the rest of the cast? A lot of faces familiar to anyone who's a fan of the Jeremy Brett Holmes series. Good actors, all.

I agree that Holm did a fine job, as did the rest of the cast.

The story goes that Deighton, who is tall himself, had someone much taller in mind for Bernard Samson than the diminutive (5'-5") Holm. Bond envy? In any case, Deighton's unhappiness with Holm's casting supposedly soured him on the entire production and led him to withdraw consent for any further distribution after the initial broadcast.

It seems incredibly petty for Deighton to still be nursing this grudge 27 years later, so I didn't feel bad at all about grabbing a copy via the torrent. Deighton didn't leave his fans any legitimate alternatives.

Seriously zany.

Most Brit men are on the order of 5'6" or so in height so putting an embargo on all non-tall actors is adding an absurd hindrance to the whole endeavor.

Thanks for the info!

Not a book (mauybe it is), but there is a terrific spy series on called Deutschland 83. I watched it last night on couchtuner.eu. Very smart, kept me totally enraptured from the first moment, which is not easy with that disease O.L.D.. Anyway, thought I might mention it even though a different venue.

there were a couple others in the same vein, which i remember enjoying:

'die kinder' starring Frederick Forrest

the original series, 'traffik' about the heroin route from pakistan to London (I believe that series is where actress julia ormond got her start).

RIP Sir Ian Holm CBE, who did a great job playing Bernard Samson in the Granada TV miniseries adaptation of Len Deighton's Game, Set and Match.

The Game, Set and Match miniseries is currently available for free on YouTube:

aw man...