JACKAL GHOST MOVIE
JACKAL GHOST PROFESSIONAL

The film is tense and the tension never goes away but that doesn't mean that things are rushed. This film has all the elements of what a good thriller should be like. For a tidy sum of money The Jackal accepts the job.

JACKAL GHOST PROFESSIONAL

The Jackal (Edward Fox) is a professional hit-man who has been hired by a French terrorists/resistance (depending on your point of view) group to kill Charles De Gaulle. Wolfgang Peterson's 'In The Line of Fire' with Clint Eastwood and John Malkovich seems to be the best exception and after that, I don't anyone has matched this movie.

JACKAL GHOST MOVIE

If there another movie that could ever match or get close to the same level of ferocious intensity of this movie has. Well-known director Fred Zinnenmen (the original 'High Noon' and 'From Here to Eternity') handles the film like a picture frame, keeping it clean and avoiding any of the typical Hollywood methods, especially the climax. The movie is based on the novel written by Frederick Forsyth ('The Dogs of War', 'The Fourth Protocol') and the adaption made by Kenneth Ross is remarkably accurate and retains mostly of the mind-numbing suspense. Once the word gets out, a noble Paris detective, Claude Lebel (Michael Lonsdale) is chosen by his superiors to apprehend the Jackal before he can pull off the assassination. And after the last attempt on DeGaulle went undone, an Englishman who is only known as the Jackal (Edward Fox) is hired to finish the job even though he wants to do it his way. are determined more than ever to take out the current president, General Charles De Gaulle, at any cost. The O.A.S., the French version of the I.R.A. If you want to see how a thriller is done with craft and cunning and without special effects, then this is the film for you.Д¬hilling yet on the ball at all times-type of a detective story and international mystery stirred up into a magnificent and skillful thriller. That is because of director Fred Zinnemann and the fact that he kept things moving along beautifully. It was a game of cat and mouse that kept you on the edge of your seat for two and a half hours without noticing the time. With just a thread, the French police inspector carefully puts together a case with as much precision as his prey. But, he had to deal with the European versions of the CIA/FBI and they were not restrained in how they handled investigations. If he had Willis' assignment, he would have gotten it done. He carefully plots his moves and is methodical in his precision. The guy even wears an ascot, for god's sake! Most people today don't even know what an ascot is. You watch the Bruce Willis version of the Jackal and you think that is so cool, but you don't know cool until you see Edward Fox do it.

I think the French minister is wearing a very bad wig. I suppose I must put something in negative so it makes for a balanced review so errr. Zimmemann's direction is great and the scenes are beautifully photographed - particularly in Paris. He is first seen attending to his pigeons and upon being told he is being put on the case simply says 'Oh God.'. The French police inspector is wonderfully underplayed and is as far away from the he-breaks-the-rules-but-he-gets-the-job-done cliche as you can possibly imagine. He never tries to justify his pernicious occupation to anyone yet, strangely, doesn't come across as an evil man.

He doesn't contain any of the cliches that you would expect to see in a film written in the last twenty years (he doesn't display mental instability, or have flashbacks to some event in his past). The character of the Jackal is brilliantly finely drawn. From Forsyth's first, and probably best book (written in less than 5 weeks) this film contains nothing that does not drive the story forward.

The cuts, where they are made, are logical and some locations are combined. This is about the best book-to-film conversion I've ever seen. Almost completely devoid of dialogue the scenes portray visually more story than most modern thrillers can fit into two hours. The opening five minutes of the film are a marvel.

Jackal ghost