You don’t see men in turtlenecks anymore. They mostly turn up in spy thrillers, these days — gloomy, conspiratorial pictures with a fall, wintry or too-early spring setting, scripted to match the Cold War that passed and the chilly one that’s taken its place.

Steven Soderbergh knows this. That’s why the director and his team put star Michael Fassbender in a whole collection of neck-hiding sweater-shirts for “Black Bag,” a crackling good mystery thriller about spies spying on spies, the hunt for a traitor and the looming menace of Russia, still trapped, blundering and bleeding in a war it started with an untrustworthy American president/ex-president/president’s blessings.

Veteran screenwriter David Koepp has written some of the biggest blockbusters of the last quarter century. But here he and Soderbergh go smaller, more intimate in turning to a tale of married spies, one of whom suspects the worst of the other.

But “Black Bag” isn’t “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” without the laughs. Casting an ex-James Bond and ex-Miss Moneypenny is about the only “joke” in it. With or without laughs, it’s witty, a crisp, chilly spy thriller with striking settings, top drawer actors and the finest wardrobe this side of “Wicked.”

The writer, director and cast hunt for treason and crueler, more personal betrayals among people “who lie for a living” in an open homage to the master of the genre, British spy author John le Carré. Koepp even names his protagonist, master interrogator and mistrusting spouse “George,” after le Carre’s greatest creation — the dull but cunning and relentless George Smiley.

This George is an obviously well-paid, well-housed and immaculately turned-out top dog in Britain’s spy agency, a man married to a senior spook (Cate Blanchett) given a tip that there’s a mole in their ranks.

There’s this malware, cleverly named for the hound that guards hell, that may have gotten out. Five people are suspected, one of them happens to be Kathryn, George’s wife.

“Some things really are best swept under a rug,” he sighs.

Still, this shouldn’t be much of a test for the most feared polygraph interrogator in the West. But George has “something more elegant” in mind. He’ll invite these colleagues to dinner, not tip his wife about what’s up, and “play a game” designed to reveal a cadre of professional liars’ darkest secrets — infidelity, ethical lapses, unprofessional behavior and perhaps treason.

That utterly delicious plot device pays dividends aplenty as it sets up this week-long, somewhat leisurely race against the clock to prevent a spy-made disaster while navigating treachery and just enough plot twists to keep us guessing.

“This ends with someone in the boot of a car,” Blanchett’s Kathryn cackles at one point. We only have to wonder who it might be, and what model Jaguar they’ll be stuffed in.

Fassbender is downright inscrutable as George — asking questions and never ever answering queries from others. But Blanchett’s Kathryn is a trickier turn. She has to conveying cynicism and innocence, planting and nurturing the seeds of doubt as she does.

Ex-Bond franchise player Naomie Harris ably plays the in-house shrink at this version of MI-whatever, a person of duty and feelings resigned to a job where she has to know most of those agents forced to meet with her will lie and lie and lie to keep their jobs and the illusion that this work doesn’t make one insane.

Sleeping with one of her agent/clients (Regé-Jean Page) might be the least of her sins.

Marisa Abela plays Clarissa, a very smart young spy-sat manager who may be compromised, as she is dating veteran spy Freddy (Tom Burke, never better) as a means of working out self-confessed “daddy issues.”

And ex-Bond Pierce Brosnan plays the old Cold Warrior spy chief, a superior not invited to that opening dinner party/interrogation who might be more in or out of the loop than everyone assumes, flailing about, ineffectually barking orders between suit changes and sushi outings.

Koepp and Soderbergh make this as much about mistrust and fidelity in a marriage as it is about spies-gone-wrong. They keep their film intimate and interrogatory, giving it an old fashioned theatrical feel.

And they insist on bringing glamour back to the spy game. Forget the coarser Bonds and jumpsuited “Mission: Impossibles.” This world has swank townhouses, gourmet food and dresses and suits to match that affluence. British civil servants make out pretty good, I must say.

And this cast, to a one, has never looked better on screen. I almost never notice clothes in a movie, but I stayed through the credits to see if Brosnan or Page’s tailors got a “Thank You.” Alas, I’ll have to settle for a turtleneck. Surely they’ll be in stock next winter, thanks to this showcase of espionage cool.

Rating: R, violence, profanity, sexual references

Cast: Michael Fassbender, Cate Blanchett, Marisa Abela, Naomie Harris, Tom Burke, Regé-Jean Page and Pierce Brosnan.

Credits: Directed by Steven Soderbergh, scripted by David Koepp. A Focus Features release.

Running time: 1:33