I just watched this film again for the third time and I enjoyed it and understood what was going on. The one weak link for me was the schoolboy - he just wasn't a good actor - his speech timing was dreadful. Surely there are some good child actors out there - why have a bad one in an otherwise good film?
shareRoach represents an innocent, whose social issues are ruthlessly exploited by Prideaux, who 'recruits' Roach as he would a fledgling spy. Later Prideaux is ashamed of what he's done, which is really the corruption of an innocent; perhaps if this kid is given a chance at a normal social life, he won't end up like the other characters in this story.
The character is greatly abridged in this film, and is far better described and detailed in the novel, a necessary and common enough evil of film adaptation. But I thought the performance was spot-on, a fearful, submissive, hesitant, weak young boy, wounded by circumstance (a symbol of Prideaux himself), easily turned to espionage by someone willing to offer him companionship. Was this how it started with Prideaux and Haydon? Possibly.
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One review I read somewhere said the boy was most like Smiley, an outsider and an astute observer with glasses.
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