The Day of the Jackal

Terrific escapist entertainment...It's a polished and exciting thriller, mercifully unburdened with heavy political/philosophical digressions.

Fox is superb as the coldly impassionate killer, and Lonsdale is properly plodding yet magnificently analytical as the detective tracking him down. A taut, suspenseful, and fascinating political thriller.

Fred Zinnemann’s The Day of the Jackal is one hell of an exciting movie. I wasn’t prepared for how good it really is: it’s not just a suspense classic, but a beautifully executed example of filmmaking. It’s put together like a fine watch. The screenplay meticulously assembles an incredible array of material, and then Zinnemann choreographs it so that the story--complicated as it is--unfolds in almost documentary starkness.

There is true beauty in the realism at the heart of what could come across a fanciful movie plot, with its documentarian coolness of execution, the crisp rhythms of Zinnemann’s direction, we feels we are staring through a window into the shadowy recesses of history.

The major asset of the film is that it succeeds in maintaining interest and suspense despite obvious viewer foreknowledge of the outcome.

Low on documentary conviction and political context, but an intriguing exercise in concealing the obvious.

The details are minutely observed and, to me, just a bit boring.

A real hired killer, smiles and interacts with people like an ordinary person, kills whoever he needs despite their kindness to him, lies and pretends perfectly, the main character is not a superhumanas it is fashionable now, he is an ordinary person and you can believe that such a person really lived or lives now.. Good classic

Un film étonnant et un thriller d’une grande rigueur. Etonnant par son réalisme très poussé, quasi documentaire ; rigoureux par sa mise en scène, efficace et sans fioriture. Le film ne repose sur aucune star à proprement parler et à part Edward Fox et le très distingué Michel Lonsdale, nous avons là un véritable petit congrès de seconds rôles et autres troisièmes couteaux français de l’époque. Le film -malgré sa longueur hélas excessive pour le genre- maintient néanmoins l’intérêt grâce au jeu du chat et de la souris auquel se livrent les services de renseignement et l’assassin à la solde de l’OAS. Un duel mano à mano en somme entre la puissance d’un Etat et la sagacité d’un caméléon insaisissable, un redoutable et sournois chacal en l’occurrence !… La toute fin apparaît quelque peu expédiée et tranche hélas trop avec le reste du film, très méthodique et réaliste mais ne faisons pas la fine bouche cependant : ce « Chacal » a dans l’ensemble bien vieilli et en impose encore aujourd’hui.