) has the cold and has been treating our couch as his own personal Jes.. er, West Bank, hiding under a blanket and watching movies. And just as I was preparing my breakfast, this devious fellow insists on choosing “The Day of the Jackal” as his next movie. And so, what option do I have but to surrender and watch this awesome movie with him, and postpone my cleaning duties? Sigh. The world is not an easy place to live in…
“The Day of the Jackal” takes place in 1963. President Charles de Gaulle has recently withdrawn France from Algeria, and given that country its independence. This pissed a great many French mightlily off, many of them army men, and they gathered in an organization called the OAS. The movie begins with a narrated description of one of their attempts to assassinate de Gaulle, describing what happened to one of the men involved in the plot, and to what the leaders of the OAS did in the month following their failure.
In the end, they concluded that their organization was so infiltrated by the French police, that they were forced to hire an outsider. This is the man who suggest they refer to him only as “Jackal”. However, this Jackal demands so grand a fee for his professional assistance, that the OAS are forced to rob a whole lot of banks to pay him. This does of course alert the French authorities that something is afoot, and they initiate an investigation.
From there on, the movie follows three or four main stories. The first is that of the Jackal, as he prepares for his mission and as he closes in on his target. The second is that of Inspector Claude Lebel, the best detective in the French police, as he leads the search for the Jackal. The third is how the British Inspector Thomas makes inquiries into the idendtity of the Jackal, as this man is an Englishman. The fourth possible main story revolves around Denise, a young woman whose fiancé was killed in Algeria. She is approached by the OAS and coerced into seducing a member of the French cabinet, and extract information from this cabinet member.
This is perhaps the only case I know of where the movie is better than the book upon which it is based. I could be wrong, of course, as I haven’t read the book since the summer of 2001, but I remember it as being a little dull and slow paced, at least compared to the author’s other books. Now, don’t get me wrong, this movie is also slow paced, but it manages to be so without ever getting boring. The Jackal is coolness incarnated, and his thourough preparation (and Denise) enables him to always stay a couple of steps ahead of the police. He is also one ruthless son of a bitch, and there’s no lengths he won’t go to, nothing he won’t do, in order to complete his mission. Lebel and Thomas are also a couple of cunning old foxes, and even though they are both old men, they are cool as few others. Also, all the roles (or most of them, anyway) are played by Brithish actors, who deliver awesomely sardonic comments in their perfect upperclass’y English.
But the best part is the way suspense is built. I don’t really know how they do it, but they do for example manage to make five minutes of nothing but footage of empty, slowly filling and full packed Parisian streets during Liberation Day seem omnious and not at all boring. Also, there is a scene where the Jackal calibrates the sniper scope on his specially designed rifle, which is just four or five minutes long, but worth every øre I paid for this DVD.
In short, an awesome, awesome, awesome movie, which you all should watch as soon as possible. Watching this movie will make you realize or remember what film making can be if film makers really did their best, and it will make you spit on the unholy piece of horsecrap that is the 1997 Gere/Willis remake.
10/10.
(Fun trivia [at least for me] : This was one of the first DVDs I ever bought, I think I got my hands on it in Molde sometime in 1999 or 2000.)
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I catched the scene where the Jackal calibrated the scope on NRK2 once, just that, nothing else. And still it was omnious as hell.
7. March 2007 @ 12:36 ( Permalink )
You caught that one, eh? One of my favourite movie scenes of all time, that one. Way better than the vulgar one in which Bruce Willis pumps out a couple thousand bullets in the remake.
7. March 2007 @ 15:21 ( Permalink )
I’m afraid to say that I’ve only seen what must be the aforementioned remake. ‘Twas not all bad, but not good either.
8. March 2007 @ 18:08 ( Permalink )
It’s probably not bad, seen by itself, I might agree with that. My problem, however, is that I’ve never seen it “by itself” (Den Ding An Sich, I believe Kant would have called it, but I’m far from sure, seeing as I kinda skipped Kant); I’ve only watched it in relation to other things (Den Ding An Mich?
) — namely the 1973 “original” and the Forsythe book. And compared to those two, it’s a piece of tacky rubbish. 
9. March 2007 @ 12:50 ( Permalink )
There’s also Den Ding An Sith, which is how easily something can be smothered by the Dark Side, and Den Ding An Mitch, which is how something will look on David Hasselhoff.
9. March 2007 @ 15:14 ( Permalink )
Yeah. Which in the case of the “Jackal” remake is “very easily indeed” for the former, and “very good indeed” for the latter.
9. March 2007 @ 15:25 ( Permalink )