The Assignment (1997) * * * A movie review by Serdar Yegulalp Copyright 1998 by Serdar Yegulalp
CAPSULE: Smart and compulsively watchable, if fanciful, thriller that employs the story of the Jackal to good psychological effect. Aidan Quinn is worth admission.
Before the terrible Bruce Willis thriller THE JACKAL hit theaters, a modestly-budgeted and far superior treatment of the same basic material came and went, with nary a whisper of promotion or even acclaim. Too bad. THE ASSIGNMENT is a far better movie -- not a classic, but it entertains and engrosses aptly -- which were two things the other movie couldn't do.
The facts behind the story are now history: The Jackal was the moniker used by a man named Carlos, who apparently masterminded or at least spearheaded many of the most (in)famous terrorist actions in recent history. He, among others, ransomed the members of OPEC at gunpoint -- an incident which is recapped in the early minutes of this film. One of the CIA men, Henry Fields (Donald Sutherland), tries to get close enough to Carlos to liquidate him with a "lead handshake" (a gun in the sleeve), but his advisors collar him before he can pull it off. Carlos vanishes with his captives.
Flash-forward. An American soldier, Annibal Ramirez (Aidan Quinn), is yanked into custody by a Mossad agent, Amos (Ben Kingsley). Ramirez is a ringer for Carlos; there is some mountingly funny byplay when we realize that it's not Carlos playing dumb, or even Carlos playing the hotheaded American bit. This guy really is an American soldier, and he really is gonna sue Amos into next Wednesday when he gets home.
Fields introduces himself to Annibal and ingratiates himself with him. They want Carlos, and Annibal is a great way for them to trap him. Annibal wants nothing to do with any spy games, but after some unpleasant manipulation, they take him under their wing and begin remaking him into a) a spy and b) a psychological twin for Carlos. They do a frighteningly good job. This is one of the best parts of the movie, where we see Annibal's straight-arrow military persona being strip-mined and replaced with a grasping, selfish and amoral one -- all the better for him to pass for Carlos.
The movie has a smartness to it that I don't see much of in American thrillers -- more of a feel for the way spy games really are conducted, complete with double-crosses and screw-ups the way they probably do go down. Maybe that has something to do with this being a Canadian/French co-production, rather than a wholly American one, and it's reflected in the way the story plays out. We don't get an ending where everything is settled with the right guy getting shot, although we do get an extra, tacked-on epilogue that's a bit more gratuitous than we really needed.
What is best here is the acting. Here we have three actors doing a great job -- Sutherland, Quinn, and Kingsley, all in a three-way psychic fencing match. One of them is trying to trap a monster; one is trying to create one. And one is becoming more of one than he ever dreamed. It's neat to watch.
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