Yahoo News The key differences between The Day of the Jackal show and the 1973 film
Sky has remade The Day of the Jackal for TV
The time has come for viewers to witness Eddie Redmayne like never before in The Day of the Jackal, Sky's new take on Frederick Forsyth's novel of the same name.
Redmayne plays the titular Jackal in the 10-part series, which follows the professional assassin as he is hired for a dangerous new job that puts him on a collision course with MI6 agent Bianca (Lashana Lynch). The series is another case of established IP being brought back for a new generation, as The Day of the Jackal was already made into an acclaimed film back in 1973.
The Edward Fox movie is largely seen as perfect production, and critics have already compared the two in their reviews of the 2024 series. But what are the differences and how do they actually compare? Let's explore.
The Day of the Jackal TV series modernises the narrative
Forsyth's book follows The Jackal in 1962, the assassin is contracted by French dissident paramilitary group the OAS to kill Charles de Gaulle, the president of France. The narrative is fictional but based on historical fact, as the OAS did plot to murder the political leader, Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry attempted to do so on 22 August 1962.
The Edward Fox film follows the narrative of the book exactly, charting the escapades of the titular assassin as he works towards killing Charles de Gaulle.
The TV version of The Day of the Jackal is set in the present day, with the assassin being given a fictional target rather than a real-life political figure like in the novel and 1973 film. The show does open with the character killing a right-wing politician in Germany, and this is likely a nod to the origins of the character.
Redmayne spoke to Yahoo UK about the new take on the narrative, saying: "When I read the first three scripts, not only is it updated so it's contemporary, which feels like a completely different world, but it retains some of the DNA of that old school spy craft.
"The chess playing, and the actual craftsmanship of it that I love from the original, I describe it as being quite analogue rather than so many espionage movies now are all computers and all that zappy screen stuff.
"And I loved the old school cat-and-mouse-ness of it, and in those first three episodes I just thought that Bianca was such a knotty, complicated figure that — rather than in the original film, it's good and evil — it's like both characters have serious moral dubiousness."
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In the book and film, The Jackal is being chased by Deputy Commissioner Claude Lebel (Michael Lonsdale) who is a less well-rounded character than Bianca, who is given a personal life and struggles she has to face over the course of the narrative, alongside finding The Jackal.
The Jackal has a personal life
Another factor of the story that is different, and some critics have taken umbrige with it, is the fact that The Jackal has a life outside of his profession. The series reveals he has a wife named Nuria (Úrsula Corberó) who lives in Spain and maintains their family home there, and doesn't question his long trips abroad for work.
Nuria is unaware of The Jackal's secret life, which creates some interesting conflicts as the story develops further. Corberó told Yahoo UK how much she enjoyed exploring this side of the villain: "This twist about having The Jackal with a personal life, I think that humanised the character and there is more conflict because he has a lot of things to to lose.
"That was one of the things that I really liked when I read the script for the first time I read the first three episodes, and I was like, wow, we are not used to seeing this in this kind of genre. We're used to seeing bada** girls and villainous men, right?
"I had the feeling that it was part of the magic of the show, because it was very different from what we are used to to see in this kind of genre."
The first five episodes of The Day of the Jackal are available to watch now on Sky Atlantic and NOW, and the next five episodes premiere on Thursday, 14 November.
