Hacker Cinema
The Day of the Jackal
1973 · Film · 143 min
Directed by Fred Zinnemann
An international assassin known as ‘The Jackal’ is employed by disgruntled French generals to kill President Charles de Gaulle, with a dedicated gendarme on the assassin’s trail.
8 positive4 neutralfrom 12 commenters
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12 comments on Hacker News
Unfortunately I feel that while it's very well shot and paced, the gendered interplay from RR and his co-star feels a little iffy in the modern day - particularly since the romantic sub-plot requires so much suspension of disbelief. So much so that the main characters in the Elmore Leonard spy-comedy "Out of Sight" ridicule it.
Apparently, as per Reddit, the director kept wanting her to look more scared in her initial scenes; explaining the horror of being kidnapped and imprisoned in her own home by a strange man. She kept pleading "But it's Robert Redford"!
If you like the espionage and unique feel of films of that era though, you can't do much better than Francis Ford Coppola's 'The Conversation', starring a wonderfully morose Gene Hackman. A very worthy Palme D'Or winner in '74.
Fred Zinnemann's 'The Day of the Jackal' in '73 is also a high-point for espionage-thrillers of the decade.
He was a favourite author of mine when I was young, many great novels.
> The Day Of The Jackal was turned into a 1973 film starring Edward Fox as the Jackal, and then became a TV drama starring Eddie Redmayne last year.
It was also the 1997 Bruce Willis movie "The Jackal": https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119395/
The Dogs of War was also a 1980 movie as well: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080641/
I punched in 1972 and there were some fantastic movies that year (The Godfather, Deliverance, Cabaret, Solaris, Jeremiah Johnson, Aguirre - the Wrath of God, The Last House on the Left, Silent Running, The Heartbreak Kid, Fat City, etc.).
Also tried 1973 — same (The Day of the Jackal, Soylent Green, Westworld, The Wicker Man, Papillon, American Graffiti, The Sting, Serpico, Mean Streets, High Plains Drifter, Don't Look Now, Badlands, The Long Goodbye, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Three Musketeers, Fantastic Planet, etc.).
I think they simply made better movies decades ago.
It seems like there's a range of better and worse ways to do it. The contemporaneous and comparable film "The Day of the Jackal" has a seduction element that is central to the plot, so it doesn't seem shoehorned in.
It's a shame as it's one of my favourite films.
It's similar for books too - so few down-to-Earth action books like that like The Day Of The Jackal or maybe The Bourne Identity and Red Storm Rising.
Roughly 20 years ago, there was a documentary on British TV about fake ID. They found that the technique used in the 1971 book The Day of the Jackal (find someone dead, get a copy of their birth certificate, bootstrap other ID from that) still worked.
They then demonstrated how you didn’t even need the person you were doing this to to be dead, as they got a provisional driving license in the name of David Blunkett. Who was the Home Secretary at the time. And is blind.
Apparently the UK police still use the Jackal method as of last year, though obviously no system can possibly prevent actions by its own enforcement body: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/dec/07/met-police-legal-action-spies-use-dead-childrens-identities
We went to where North Korea tricked their agents for Kim Jong-nam's assignation.
I expected some sort of back alley brothel, but it was just the number one spot on Tripadvisor.
I think like all these things don't get stuck into a rut thinking the people doing this stuff are amazing or smart. You just need belief in yourself, and probably not even that. I bet Kim Jong-un top assassins had imposer syndrome too. (The on-ground recruits thought they were on a game show)
The Day of the Jackal movie (1973) was good for the work ethic part I thought, I haven't read the book - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0069947/
One of my favorite moments in that scene is hearing Avon say "You'd need a day of the jackal motherfucker for that" and Googling that phrase and discovering and watching the amazing movie of the same name. Thus realizing even more just how perfect that line was in context.
The Wire definitely took attention to detail seriously.
It's been shown multiple times on TCM (American basic cable movie channel) with subtitles.
It pairs well with The Day of the Jackal.
The very best torture scene I've read or scene was the one in Day of The Jackal - where they torture the legionnaire to divulge the location of the OAS leadership. Putting myself in his shoes, there is no way - no matter the importance of the information - that I wouldn't break.
The main difference between that scene vs. say Babylon 5 or StarTrek is not only the violence (for instance Captain Picard doesn't have electrodes connected to the end of his penis) but the fact the the person being tortured knows for a fact he will be killed after it's all over. There is not psychological game going on: the reason he ultimately divulges information is so that the pain will stop. He wants and begs them to kill him.
I've never seen an equally powerful scene in any movie or book.
Congratulations on the new hire.
And thanks for posting the step-by-step. That's always interesting to read. It reminds me of that movie, The Day of the Jackal (the 1971 version, I didn't see the new one) -- people want to know the process.
What is Carbonmade's new app that's alluded to here? Sounds interesting. Any hints?
Primer - Ultra low budget film about a couple of engineers who accidentally invent a time machine in their garage while working on a startup.
Blow - Not really a hacker movie, but it's rags-to-riches-to-rags storyline should be interesting to a lot of entrepreneurs.
Day of the Jackal - Not a hacker movie either, but the main character's methodical preparation for an assassination will appeal to a lot of hackers.
The Net - A pretty good thriller about a hacker who has her identity stolen in a big conspiracy.
Fat Man and Little Boy - Slow but well done movie about the Manhattan Project.