Sunday, January 16, 2005
PROCEDURAL
Today's movie is a wonderful 'police procedural' on an international scale. It is beautifully filmed almost exclusively on location and, while it is longer than my normal attention span, it kept me going for two and a half hours.
The screen title says, aptly and appropriately for a change, "Fred Zinnemann's film based on Frederick Forsythe's The Day of the Jackal (1973)".
Take a look at Zinnemann's credits; he made four or five Best Films.
The plot is a bit complicated and yet it is made clear and the parts assembled beautifully for involvement throughout. We get to figure things out at about the same pace as the police and the jackal. Both sides are shown working each other.
It is not violent in the usual sense. There is some tough stuff. It is about an attempted assassination after all. But the film is perfect proof that a lot of sensational chases and gut spills are not necessary for a taut and exciting story to unfold.
I liked it a lot. James Fox is a fox. I will give this NYTimes Best 1176 Film a 5 out of Netflix5.
