It's so awful. And that moment when he goes back down the wall, to Liz. What happens to Liz is so terrible. And he goes back down when he hears Smiley shouting "Where is she?" Only Smiley doesn't seem to be asking if she's alive but if she's dead. He wants Leamas back, not the innocent woman.

No wonder it made him famous, imagine how this most have hit people in what was it, 1961.