MovieChat Forums > The Day of the Jackal (1973) Discussion > Is it implied that he killed the gunsmit...

Is it implied that he killed the gunsmith?


Is it implied that he killed the gunsmith when the Jackal requested a round in the flat in Genoa?

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No, I don't think so. He might well need that bloke for a future job, despite his plans for retirement. In other words, good business sense is not to kill all your suppliers. Besides that, the gunsmith doesn't know who he's planning to shoot or what M. Le Chacal's real name is.

He asks for the explosive bullet that we later see him unwrapping and firing during the melon test-firing, after he's adjusted and fixed the sights.

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Free your mind and the rest will follow

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I think the gunsmith is supposed to contrast with the guy who was assigned to falsify passports, he was all professional and didn't ask too much questions, so the Jackal had no reason to kill him, even in his malevolent business, he's got some ethics. The other one tried to blackmail him and got what was coming to him. I guess there's a strongly implied paralle between the two guys in order to highlight how you should deal with the Jackal and how you should not.

By the way, the photo guy is perhaps the one I felt the least sorry for because he could clearly see that the Jackal was potentially dangerous, he was fool enough to hide the original documents and still, he had to sign his own death warrant by telling that he was the only one to know when they were hidden and that no one could come to his secret 'laboratory'.

"Darth Vader is scary and I The Godfather"

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Thanks, that's all interesting comment :-)

However, I would like to get away from the idea that the Jackal goes around killing his suppliers after they've supplied. That only goes on in daft Hollywood thrillers, whereas the beauty of this film is that it's far more grounded in reality.

If he went round killing all suppliers, word would spread quickly and suppliers would take an extra interest in who we was to protect themselves from the same fate. This encourages enquiry and nosiness, not the anonymity he wants. Turning up as anonymously as can be possible, paying in cash and disappearing off quietly would be his modus operandi.

The forger met an exceptional fate because he threatened the Jackal's anonymity.

I hate to do the 'read the book' bit but it's covered well in there. There the gunsmith also gets the same stark warning that the forger got, about forgetting about him after he leaves, adding that he will die if he transgresses this. The gunsmith then reflects on the book detailing names of all his customers that he has buried in the garden (or somewhere).

You can refer to http://ajaytao2010.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/frederick-forsyth-day-of-the-jackal.pdf but extracts are:

...

He (Goosens) felt no qualms as he waited on the morning of July 21st, 1963, for the arrival of an Englishman who had been guaranteed to him over the phone by one of his best customers, a former mercenary in the seance of Katanga from 1960 to 1962 and who had since masterminded a protection business among the whorehouses of the Belgian capital.

...

Monsieur,' said the Belgian skilfully pocketing the notes, `it is a pleasure to do business both with a professional and a gentleman.'

`There is a little more,' went on his visitor, as though he had not been interrupted. `You will make no attempt further to contact Louis, nor to ask him or anyone else who I am, nor what is my true identity. Nor will you seek to enquire for whom I am working, nor against whom. In the event that you should try to do so it is certain I shall hear about the enquiries. In that eventuality you will die. On my return here, if there has been any attempt to contact the police or to lay a trap, you will die. Is that understood?'

M. Goossens was pained. Standing in the hallway he looked up at the Englishman, and an eel of fear wriggled in his bowels. He had faced many of the tough men of the Belgian underworld when they came to him to ask for special or unusual weapons, or simply a run of-the-mill snub-nosed Colt Special. These were hard men. But there was something distant and implacable about the visitor from across the Channel who intended to kill an important and well-protected figure. Not another gangland boss, but a big man, perhaps a politician. He thought of protesting or expostulating, then decided better.

`Monsieur,' he said quietly, `I do not want to know about you, anything about you. The gun you will receive win bear no serial number. You see, it is of more importance to me that nothing you do should ever be traced back to me than that I should seek to know more than I do about you. Bonjour, monsieur.'

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Free your mind and the rest will follow

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and an eel of fear wriggled in his bowels...there was something distant and implacable about the visitor from across the Channel


Yes! That undefinable coldness from "Jackal" that made "observant" people quake a bit--William Wisher used the same sort of prose to describe the Terminator in his dealings with 'the guy at the phonebooth'---he was going to make an issue about being thrown aside but the cyborg's emotionless eyes & 'indifferent body language' made him decide not to try anything--don't poke the shark.

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Also occurred to me that, were the Jackal wanting to murder him, the last thing he'd use is an explosive bullet. That'd spray himself with blood and bits of gunk from anywhere close. He'd either use a plain round or his hands, the most bloodless way.

But it's academic as there is nothing to gain from killing him but lots to lose. It's only Planet Hollywood owners that do something so daft in films.

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Free your mind and the rest will follow

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If you read the novel you would have your answer: Jackal does not kill the gunsmith. He knows that the gunsmith deals with dangerous characters and takes precaution (such as leaving his lawyer with an envelope containing the list of potential murderers in case he gets killed). In addition, Jackal knows that the gunsmith would not talk because if he does it would end up directly leading to his own involvement in the murder.

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obviously you did nor read the novel--Jackal knows that the gunsmith would have protected himself by leaving a letter with his lawyer in case he dies under any suspicious circumstances after seeing a client. So Jackal's choice is not to kill him. In any case the gunsmith would know it was in his interest to keep mum when he read the newspaper--Otherwise he would be revealed as accessory to murder of a President!!!
Well, I grant there is the scene that Jackal asks for one of those cartridges converted with explosive bullet and the gunsmith hands one over wrapped in tissue (a safety precaution)--As a professional killer Jackal would have asked for one of the unconverted cartridges if he wanted to finish off the gunsmith: an explosive bullet would have spattered all over he room with Mr. Pozzi's bloody body parts........

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It is claimed in the IMDB trivia for this film that a scene was shot of him killing the gunsmith, but it was deleted. In the novel, he definitely lets the gunsmith live.
Leaving a trail of dead bodies is problematic for the Jackal. Killing the Baroness for example allows the police to start an openly declared manhunt for him without having to reveal the assassination plot to the media.

"Chicken soup - with a *beep* straw."

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