Carlos

The life, times and decline of a notorious figure are depicted in forensic detail and massively ambitious scope in CARLOS, a hugely compelling if unwieldy three-part fictional biography of Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, the terrorist and revolutionary. Better known under his nom de guerre Carlos and - though the name is never used here - the media sobriquet “the Jackal”, Sánchez was a legendary headline-grabber in the 1970s, notably for taking hostage the delegates of an OPEC conference in Vienna and for a number of killings, for which he is currently serving time in France. Based on extensive research, the film nevertheless advertises itself in its opening titles as fiction - partly because grey areas remain in Carlos’s biography - but comes across as a serious attempt to explore the career, motivations and personality of a figure who not only stands as an icon of a certain period of terrorism, but also represents many of the contradictions and complexities of modern international politics. The film shows Assayas switching with brio from his more familiar intimate mode (such as Clean, Summer Hours), without overtly playing the genre games of Demonlover or Irma Vep. CARLOS comes across as a detached imaginative reconstruction, somewhat in the vein of “The Battle of Algiers” and Paul Greengrass’s “United 93”. Jonathan Romney