The 5.5 hour version of 'Carlos' has to be one of the best films of the 21st century. It is absolutely incredible. The story is gripping, and complex. The locales are exotic and the sets are fantastic, like a globetrotting time machine back to the late 1970s. There is plenty of action but most the film consists of dialogue. And what dialogue! It is a feast of a smorgasbord of foreign languages.

I can't recommend it enough.

Carlos is about the famed Leftist Venezuelan terrorist Carlos the Jackal played by Edgar Ramirez. He decided to fight for radical Palestinian groups and became one of the most infamous men in the world. The story documents his rise and fall and more importantly what led to a period of international terrorism in the 1970s and why it ended.

The movie comes in different parts.

The first lays out that Carlos is committed to Third World liberation struggles against the West. He goes to work for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) which was a radical group opposed to Yasser Arafat that believed attacks around the world was the way to push the Palestinian issue. Carlos is eager to move up but has to prove himself in Europe. This shows Carlos’ motivation and his drive. It also explains the environment in the world at that time when there were committed Leftists around the world pushing all kinds of causes from the War in Vietnam to the fight against Latin American dictatorships to a war against capitalism. There were all kinds of groups to join from peaceful to violent at that time as well. Carlos and others chose armed revolution.

The next part is about the cost of celebrity. Carlos carries out a dramatic attack and becomes famous. In the process he becomes a gun for hire going from one Arab country to another looking for backing. The last part is the impact of the end of the Cold War when Carlos losses all his powerful friends. This shows how the Leftist groups were only able to grow and carry out attacks with the backing of foreign governments. During the Cold War the Soviet Union was also pushing Third World revolutionaries. When that competition with the West ended so did the support and Carlos and others suffered the consequences.

What interesting is that Carlos’ body is symbolic of his situation. When he’s thin and in shape that means he’s doing well. When he’s fat he’s struggling.

Overall this is a great exploration of Carlos and the world of revolutionaries and governments he operated within.

I was thoroughly impressed with this movie and thought Edgar Ramirez did an incredible job of portraying the Jackal. I remember studying him and his crimes in college and his rogue, often loud, reckless and immature approach of “look at me everyone” was nailed perfectly. Ramirez has become a favorite actor of mine and every time I see him in something new, he never disappoints. Carrying a movie like this as the lead, is no small feat but he did it without a wrinkle and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I suppose if you were born and raised in Europe you might like the movie. I am used to American film production quality and acting. Not to say some exceptional cinema originates in Europe, but this is definite not one of those. The star mincing nude in front of a mirror and window is hilarious and pretty much defines the entire movie. If you don’t mind wasting your money this is actually an unintended comedy, but otherwise don’t waste your money. I don’t know how it received so many stars from other viewers.

This mini-series was an overall disappointment to me in large part due to their not showing English subtitles when the characters spoke English. If languages other than English were spoken the dialogue was subtitled, but not for English.

I bought this film largely due to the presence of English subtitles as I have a serious hearing impairment, so their absence made the film extremely hard for me to follow.

From what I could hear, the story itself was mostly true, and it showed what went on in the minds of terrorists of that era.

But, if you speak and understand English and have a serious hearing problem, be warned that this film will likely be hard to understand.

Impressively filmed with great locations. But the script is a train-wreck. There is no story arc and no resolution to anything -- Carlos is a cool-looking bad ass dude who almost immediately reveals himself to be incoherent, and he just devolves from there. From that point, the movie continues for a couple more hours.

From the first viewing of this action packed drama I knew that I would want my own copy of this well acted dramatization of a real character.

This is very subjective, but I loved this movie from the first time I saw it. The acting is superb, the story captivating, the photography very nice and somewhat yellow and the epic length of this production enjoyable. I am a fan of the director's other movies (Olivier Assayas), also. This package came with a bunch of extras. Note: As stated in the movie, this is loosely based on The Jackal, but it not intended to be a documentary and plenty of creative license was used.