While “The Day of the Jackal” is a famed Hollywood film based on the Forsyth novel, Mr. Ramirez’s exploits have also been captured on the silver screen. A French television series by director Olivier Assayas has been released as a 165-minute biopic named “Carlos” that won a Golden Globe award. In it, the Carlos figure plays out as a kind of alter-ego of James Bond.
The director was a student in the Paris Left Bank at the time Ramirez shot two police and an informer and disappeared. The director later said in an interview, “Nobody seemed to be able to catch him or even locate him. Things like that fire the imagination. It's all about the mystery. Of course, once you start to find out the truth – after the end of the cold war – you realize how disconnected the myth is from the reality."
[ Video is no longer available. ]
