The Jackal . Newcity Chicago . 11-17-97

The Jackal

DIRECTED BY: Michael Caton-Jones

REVIEWED: 11-17-97

Shortly before his death, veteran director Fred Zinneman, who made 1972's gripping "Day of the Jackal," made known his disdain for a remake and asked that Michael Caton-Jones' filming of a script by Chuck Farrer ("Hard Target," "Navy SEALs") be given a different title. After some reported dickering with Sony to lift a title from one of their works-in-progress, Universal wound up with "The Jackal." Zinneman's dead, so at least he never had to get further downwind from this labyrinth carved from Velveeta. Despite the advance press in which Bruce Willis crowed about his daring, daring, daring scene in which he kisses a man on the lips, I was anticipating a better movie than the production manager's nightmare of geographic sprawl that's on display. (And yes, the preview audience did howl when the two men kissed, much as they might at the sight of a cute little puppy being ripped in half on-camera.) Jumping from location to location, accompanied by stern titles -- "Moscow"; "Montreal"; "Helsinki"; "Helsinki Airport" -- "The Jackal" quickly becomes an outlandish smear of complication and crudeness. Willis plays yet another one of those just-too-damn-smart ubermonsters, those strenuously implausible yet all-powerful, all-knowing tricksters. Mostly he smirks, like Hudson Hawk without the harmonica. Richard Gere does passable work as Declan Mulqueen, an IRA terrorist brought onto an FBI team despite the fact he's a prison lifer and not to be trusted; and Sidney Poitier, as the FBI agent-in-charge, is strident, eye-rolling and outright awful. Still, Diane Venora has fun as a facially scarred Russian major, sleek and glossy as a seal, puffing cigs with silken relish. The credits by Imaginary Forces, the company behind the opening sequences of "Seven" and "The Island of Dr. Moreau," are hypnotic. Then, the movie.

--Ray Pride

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The Jackal

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The Jackal
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Other Films by Michael Caton-Jones
Rob Roy
Scandal

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