CARLOS

About 15 minutes into “Carlos”, Oliver Assayas’s excited, exciting, epic dramatization about the international terrorism brand known as Carlos the Jackal, the character takes a long, loving, vainglorious look in the mirror at his naked body.  It’s 1974 and after a bungled assassination attempt and an ineffectual bombing, Carlos has just headed down the flamboyant career path – riddled with bodies, rutted by explosions and festooned with publicity – that will inspire pulp fictions, detailed biographies, hyperventilated conspiracy theories and lasting myths.  As he luxuriates in his own image, you can see how Carlos saw himself: the terrorist as pinup.

Dargis/Jackal

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