The Day of the Jackal is a 1973 film set in August 1963, based on a novel of the same name by Frederick Forsyth. Directed by Fred Zinnemann, it stars Edward Fox as the assassin known only as "the Jackal" who was hired to assassinate Charles de Gaulle.
The film was expensive to produce, as it was filmed in numerous locations throughout Europe. Despite being heavily promoted, being based on a successful novel, and receiving generally positive reviews, the film was a box-office failure. It did, however, make Edward Fox a star, though many speculated the film's lack of an established star (with Michael Caine having lobbied for the lead role) was the reason for its lack of success. However, Zinnemann wanted the part to be played by an unknown to emphasise that the Jackal was a faceless outsider. In his review of the film, Roger Ebert gave it a perfect 4/4 rating, and referred to it as "one hell of an exciting movie", and a "beautifully executed example of filmmaking".
Synopsis
This story takes dramatic historical events and builds on them.
Dissatisfied with French President Charles de Gaulle's decision to give independence to Algeria, the OAS, a militant French underground organization, decide to assassinate de Gaulle, believing they can restore the glory of France by killing him.
Jean Bastien-Thiry, a former military engineer, led the most prominent real assassination attempt against De Gaulle, and this event is recreated. The group set an ambush in the Paris suburb of Petit-Clamart on August 22, 1962. De Gaulle's car, an unarmored Citroën DS, was raked with machine gun fire, but de Gaulle, along with his wife and entourage, were able to escape without injury. The shots had punctured two of the tires, but the car was still able to escape at full speed, foiling the attempt. Bastien-Thiry and several other members of the plot are caught and executed.
The story enhances this historical event by imagining that the remaining leadership, demoralized and having fled the country to escape capture, realize they cannot finish the job they have started and hire a professional assassin.
After examining the dossiers of several candidates, they settle on one man, who comes to visit them. He points out that they have no choice about hiring a professional assassin: not only is their organization riddled with police informants, but their bungling has made the job more difficult because de Gaulle's security has been enhanced. He agrees to take the assignment provided they pay half his large fee in advance, and comply with several conditions. There will be no further contact between the four men, other than a telephone number in Paris he can call to get information. He will only be known by his code name: The Jackal.
The movie follows preparations the Jackal (Edward Fox) makes, including how, when and where to perform the hit (which is not disclosed), creation of fake identities and obtaining resources such as a rifle modified to look like something else, and photographs of himself as an old man. Despite being the title character, the "Jackal" talks least of all the characters; we understand his motivations and his brilliance by his actions. The violence is subdued; the additional killings the Jackal performs in the process of covering his actions are brief and almost invisible, or performed off-screen.
Meanwhile, security forces discover that a rash of bank robberies is being committed by the OAS. Realizing leaders of the OAS are using the robberies to finance something, the Gaullist Service d'Action Civique (referred to throughout as the Action Service and treated as a semi-state paramilitary force) detains their chief clerk, Adjutant Viktor Wolenski (Jean Martin). Rather than request Wolenski's extradition, Action Service kidnap him in Italy and smuggle him into France.
Torturing Wolenski to death, Action Service extracts enough information to discover there is possibly a plot on the life of President de Gaulle by a foreign assassin whose code name may be Jackal, and if that is the case, it represents a national emergency. The Interior Minister (Alan Badel) convenes a group of key advisers and the head of state police admits there is no way they can find this Jackal by normal means. They can't detain him at the border; they don't know his name. Action Service can't destroy him if he's in another country; they don't know whom to destroy. They can't arrest him if he's in the country; they don't know who he is. They can't search for him, they don't know what he looks like. Without a name or face, they can do nothing. In short, they need the best detective to discover who The Jackal is — in secrecy — before he plunges France into a crisis.
The Police Commissioner admits there is one man, a brilliant detective working for him, who can do the job: Deputy Commissioner Claude Lebel (Michael Lonsdale). Lebel is told to drop everything, focus on finding the Jackal and stopping him. He will have full powers and any resources he needs, subject to two requirements — no publicity, and do not fail. Lebel's assistant Caron asks, "But no crime has been committed yet, so where are we supposed to start looking for the criminal?", to which Lebel answers, "We start by recognizing that, after de Gaulle, we are the two most powerful people in France."
As the Jackal sets up his preparations to commit the crime, Lebel also prepares to determine where the Jackal might be from, how he might perform the act and when and where he will do so. No known French-born criminal fits the limited description of the Jackal, so Lebel uses an old boy network of police agencies in other countries to obtain leads. Special Branch in Britain have no information, but in turn pass the request to MI5, who report "tap room" information that the Jackal might be a hired assassin named Charles Calthrop. Though their information is vague, they realise that "Cha" in Charles and "Cal" in Calthrop spell the French word for Jackal.
The police search Calthrop's flat, and recover his passport. As he must therefore be using a false passport, they search records of births and deaths to find anyone who has obtained a British passport using the birth certificate of a deceased child. They find a dead child, Paul Oliver Duggan, who applied for a passport decades after he had died. Lebel discovers a few hours too late that the Jackal, travelling under the identity of Duggan, has already entered France.
The Jackal has been informed that his mission is no longer secret, but after considering making for the border nevertheless continues on with his plan. He stops in a hotel in Grasse, where he finds an attractive married woman, Madame Colette de Montpellier (Delphine Seyrig), whose husband is on holiday. He discovers Madame de Montpellier's room number and residential address from the hotel register, and spends that night with her in her bed. He then checks out early before Lebel can arrive, and disguises his car with stolen number plates and new paint. As he drives north, he is involved in a crash with another car. Abandoning his own, he steals the other, comparatively undamaged, car and drives to Madame de Montpellier's home.
After a love encounter, she mentions the police had been there, asking about him, and she knows he stole his car because it has local plates, but she will protect him if he'll tell her what he's doing. He kisses and quietly strangles her. He then assumes a new identity as a bespectacled schoolteacher, using a Danish passport he stole before at London Airport. He leaves early the next morning in Madame de Montpellier's car, driving to the railway station in Tulle, where he boards a train bound for Paris.
Madame de Montpellier's servants discover that she been murdered, and give the Police the Jackal's description. Lebel no longer has to look for the Jackal in secrecy but can make a full-publicity search for a murderer. They discover that the Danish schoolteacher, Per Lundquist, boarded the Paris train, and race to Austerlitz Station, but arrive a few minutes too late to intercept the Jackal.
In the meantime, Lebel tells the cabinet that a telephone tap has revealed that one of them has a mistress, to whom he has revealed details of the investigation in pillow talk. Lebel admits he didn't know whose telephone to tap, so he tapped them all. Several of the cabinet members are surprised and perturbed (although the guilty minister admits it was he, and departs the meeting meekly, obviously now having forfeited his prominent position and reputation, in disgrace). Lebel also realizes they have only a few days to find the Jackal, because he will shoot de Gaulle on Liberation Day, when the President will make several public appearances. Apparently dissatisfied at Lebel's presumptuousness in tapping their phones, the cabinet dismisses him with their thanks, saying they no longer need his help now that the manhunt has become public.
The Jackal knows all Parisian hotels are being watched by police. He enters a bathhouse and is approached by another man, who picks him up. They go to the man's apartment. Later the man sees a television in a shop window, recognizing the Jackal's face but not knowing why. As he mentions this to the Jackal, the television in the apartment has a newsflash that Lundquist is wanted for the murder of Madame de Montpellier. The Jackal kills the man off-screen in his kitchen, then switches off the television.
The Interior Minister recalls Lebel, realising that the 100,000 police and gendarmes looking for the Jackal will not find him, and that they need Lebel after all.
On Liberation Day, the Jackal moves into a square where De Gaulle will later present medals to veterans of the Resistance. The Jackal has made himself look like an elderly veteran amputee, with service medals on his inexpensive coat. At the barrier, he passes a gendarme who inspects his papers but, seeing a one-legged old man on crutches, lets him pass. The Jackal goes into an apartment building, knocks out the landlady, unties his leg, goes into a top-floor flat, and reveals that his crutches had a more sinister purpose, as he disassembles them to convert them into a single shot rifle with a telescope sight, firing explosive mercury bullets.
While the Jackal waits for the ceremony to begin, Lebel is continuing to circulate, trying to guess from where the Jackal will strike. As De Gaulle arrives for the presentation, Lebel runs into the gendarme who had earlier met the disguised Jackal. After Lebel confirms his suspicions with the gendarme, the two of them run toward the apartment building to search for the Jackal.
As De Gaulle presents the first medal, the Jackal puts him in his sights. The Jackal fires, but has not taken into account the French custom of kissing on both cheeks. De Gaulle bends forward to deliver the kiss, and the bullet misses. As the Jackal reloads, Lebel orders the gendarme to machine gun the locked door, thus allowing them entry to the top-floor flat. The Jackal quickly turns toward the two, then shoots and kills the gendarme. As the Jackal starts reloading to shoot again, Lebel grabs the dead gendarme's MAT-49 submachine gun. Before the Jackal can shoot him, Lebel fires a burst which hurls the Jackal across the room, dead. Lebel then looks out the window as the oblivious de Gaulle continues with the ceremony, unaware of how close death came to him that day.
Back in Britain, as police are looking over Calthrop's apartment, Charles Calthrop (Edward Hardwicke) walks in and demands to know who they are and what they are doing. Only then does it become apparent that the Charles Calthrop who sparked the entire investigation was not actually the Jackal after all.
At the end of the film, as we watch the Jackal's coffin being lowered into the grave, we are left with the question: "Who the hell was he?"
Cast and roles
Differences between the film and the book
| In the book... |
In the film... |
| The action occurs over two to three months (June through August, 1963) and there are several periods when the Jackal bides his time. |
The main action is compressed into the month of August. |
| The only previous confirmed kills by the "Jackal" are those of two German Scientists in Egypt and possibly that of Rafael Trujillo |
According to the OAS dossier, the Jackal has killed Rafael Trujillo and "that fella in the Congo" (perhaps Patrice Lumumba). |
| The Jackal buys his rifle from a gunsmith and kills a blackmailing forger in Belgium |
The Jackal does the same but in Genoa, Italy. |
| The Jackal meets with the Gunsmith (named Monsieur Goosens) three times: the first to order the rifle, the second to receive it, and the third after having tested it. In the latter scene, the Jackal muses about killing Goosens (having already killed the forger for swindling him) if he should talk to anybody about his business or try to gather information about the Jackal's identity or intentions. In anticipation of this potential threat, Goosens leaves incriminating evidence with his lawyer for use if necessary. |
The Jackal meets with the Gunsmith (now named Gozzi) only twice and does not return after testing the rifle. The Gunsmith's fate is left unknown, but all mention of him leaving incriminating evidence behind is removed and the film implies that the Jackal kills him. |
| In the novel the Jackal kills a French noblewoman when she accidentally discovers he is planning to assassinate Charles de Gaulle. Lebel berates himself for not meeting with the woman. |
Lebel visits the woman at her estate. She is murdered after she tells the Jackal she was visited by the police. |
| No car accident takes place. |
The Jackal has a car accident and takes the other car. |
| Colonel Rolland of Action Services meets with representatives of the Unione Corse, the Corsician Mafia, promising them a loosening of French police pressure for information on the Jackal. |
This subplot is not included in the film. |
| A French cabinet minister resigns after it is exposed that he unknowingly gave secrets to a mistress/OAS agent. |
The cabinet minister commits suicide. |
| The Jackal waits one or two days at a hotel before insinuating himself into the company of a homosexual man in Paris in order to avoid detection. |
The Jackal meets the man immediately upon arriving in Paris. |
| In order to begin his relationship with Jules, the homosexual, the Jackal disguises himself as an American college student, Marty Schulberg, and picks him up in a gay bar. Per Lundqvist is an older Danish priest, and the Jackal uses this identity only briefly. |
The Jackal disguises himself as Per Lundqvist, a Danish schoolteacher, and picks up Jules in a Turkish bath. |
Character names:
Viktor Kowalski (OAS courier)
Jacqueline (OAS agent who seduces the Interior Minister )
Madame de Chalonniere
Alexander James Quentin Duggan (The Jackal's alias) |
Viktor Wolenski
Denise
Madame de Montpellier
Paul Oliver Duggan |
| Kowalski is arrested in France after being lured there by a ruse that his daughter is dying of leukemia. |
Wolenski is kidnapped in Rome by Action Services agents. |
Production
Besides Michael Caine (as mentioned above), Jack Nicholson and Roger Moore were both considered for the title role.
The French government was extremely helpful in the filming of the movie, providing soldiers and use of exclusive locations for the filming of the final Liberation Day sequence. Fred Zinnemann wrote that Adrian Cayla-Legrand, the actor who played de Gaulle, was mistaken by several Parisians for the real thing during filming - though de Gaulle had been dead for two years prior to the film's release. The sequence was filmed during a real parade, leading to confusion; the crowd (many of whom were unaware that a film was being shot) mistook the actors portraying police officers for real officers, and many tried to help them arrest the "suspects" they were apprehending in the crowd.
Some critics have seen visual and thematic similarities between the film and the John F. Kennedy assassination. These include the shot of the exploding watermelon during the Jackal's target practice, the man being carted away by an ambulance during the parade (recalling a similar incident Dealey Plaza), and the presence of a magazine with JFK's picture on the cover in the hotel scene. Also, the setting is in August 1963, three months before Kennedy's death. Save the last, these were not evident in the original novel, and were probably inserted by the director, Fred Zinnemann.
Although the plot is set in 1962/1963, filmmakers made no efforts to avoid showing car models whose production began later, for example Peugeot 504 (built from 1968), Renault 12 (built from 1969) or in the Genoa set a Fiat 128 (1969).
The train picking up the Jackal on his trip to Paris is pulled by a different locomotive than the one shown as the assassin arrives in Paris.
Awards and nominations
Won
Nominations
See also
External links
|
Films directed by Fred Zinnemann |
|
| 1930s |
Menschen am Sonntag • Redes • Friend Indeed • They Live Again • Tracking the Sleeping Death • That Mothers Might Live • The Story of Doctor Carver • Weather Wizards • While America Sleeps • Help Wanted • One Against the World • The Ash Can Fleet • Forgotten Victory
|
|
| 1940s |
|
|
| 1950s |
|
|
| 1960s |
|
|
| 1970s |
The Day of the Jackal • Julia
|
|
| 1980s |
|
|
