The Story
In March 1954 Ahmed Ben Bella, an
ex-sergeant in the French army, joined eight other
Algerian exiles in Egypt to form a revolutionary committee
that later became the National Liberation Front (Front de Libération Nationale, FLN).
A few months later, the FLN launched its bid for Algerian
independence with coordinated attacks on public buildings,
military and police posts, and communications
installations.
A steady rise in guerrilla action over
the next two years forced the French to bring in
reinforcements; eventually 400,000 French troops were
stationed in Algeria. The FLN combined guerrilla tactics
with the deliberate use of terrorism which effectively immobilized
the superior
French forces while creating a
climate of fear throughout the country. This in turn
brought counterterrorism, as French army
units raided muslim villages and slaughtered suspected FLN
sympathizers.
In 1956 the war spread to the cities.
In Algiers, cafés, schools, and shops became targets, as
the nationalists sought to weaken French morale and draw
international attention to their cause. This Algiers
uprising was ruthlessly put down, and the French gradually gained the upper hand by
using new tactics: villages suspected of aiding
the guerillas were subject to
massacres, bombings, and forced relocation. Electrified fences along the Tunisian and Moroccan
borders effectively cut off FLN soldiers outside Algeria
from units inside the country.
Despite their military superiority,
the French were unable to find a political solution
satisfactory to both the French army and the FLN.
International criticism of France increased, and France’s allies
in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization worried about the commitment of French forces to an
unpopular war.
In May 1958 French
army officers threatened to overthrow
the French government, charging it with vacillation. A Committee
for Public Safety demanded the return to
office of General
Charles de Gaulle--the wartime leader of the
Free French--as the only one who could settle the
war and preserve French Algeria. De Gaulle,
however, was a realist; once in power he recognized that
the war was unwinnable. In 1959 DeGaulle founded the
Fifth Republic and as its new president, he announced his
intention of allowing Algerians to choose between
independence and continued association with France through
a popular referendum.
The plan struck the military
like a thunderbolt. Outraged, they staged an
unsuccessful revolt against de Gaulle in early
1960, and again in 1961. Both times, however, the
bulk of the army remained loyal to the government.
Associated with the generals’ plot was a group of military extremists called the Secret Army Organization
(OAS), which carried on a brutal campaign of
counterterrorism against both the FLN and French
authorities. Riots were initiated, public
buidlings were bombed, and banks were robbed. There
were also several unsuccessful to assassinate DeGaulle
until a cease-fire
was finally arranged between government and FLN
representatives at Evian, France in 1962.
This movie is a fictionalized account of an actual
attempt on DeGaulle's life.
In this story, the OAS commanders desperation to
assassinate DeGaulle and overthrow the Fifth Republic coupled with the dire consequences that face
them if they are unsuccessful forces them to
turn to a professional. Their
search is made even more difficult by the
government's determination to stamp out
the
OAS for good and the President's declaration of
a National Emergency under Article 16 of the constitution;
this removed the legal restraints from law enforcement. The
OAS
search
leads to an
extremely
able and professional hit man who
agrees to take up the assignment for half a
million US dollars and on the conditions that he
will remain anonymous and operate on his own
terms with absolutely no outside interference.
The
OAS is in the dark about the true identity
of this assassin and only refer to him by the
code name “Le Chacal” (“Jackal” in French).
To finance their operation, the
OAS goes on a spree of robbing banks
and armored cars.
They also engage one of their female operatives to
get close to an official high in De Gaulle’s
government so she can keep the
OAS informed of the French Government’s
investigations into the
OAS and the leaders in turn pass on the
information to the Jackal.
The Jackal then sets about carefully planning and
meticulously preparing for the assassination. He starts by contacting a gun maker to make a customized break-away gun
complete with specialized telescopic sight and
explosive bullets.
On the other side, French government agents--concerned by the lack of information about the
OAS and its plans--kidnap an
OAS courier in Italy and pack him back to
France. The courier is tortured into revealing the
existence of the Jackal, and the French put their best
detective, Claude Lebel, on the case to track
down the Jackal before he can assassinate the president. The
OAS informs the Jackal that his code name is
known to French officials, but the assassin feels
challenged and decides to go ahead with the plan anyway. The
result is a cat-and-mouse game in which Lebel
uses every means possible to find out about the
whereabouts of The Jackal before he can carry out his
assignment.
