The Assignment

In 1974, Carlos has sex with a woman and kills a spider with his cigarette, then evicts her from his room. He dons a disguise and walks to a cafe where CIA agent Henry Fields sits at a table. Recognizing Fields would reveal him, Carlos asks for a light; Fields does not recognize him due to the disguise. He detonates a grenade at the cafe, killing dozens.

In 1975, Carlos launches an assault on an OPEC meeting in Austria to force a ransom. The CIA sends Fields to identify and (if possible) neutralize him. The plan to shake Carlos's hand is foiled when a CIA superior stops the maneuver, fearing photographs would betray the operation.

In an open-air market in Jerusalem, Carlos is apparently captured and brutally interrogated by Mossad commander Amos. The prisoner claims to be US naval officer Annibal Ramirez, and his credentials are believed to be genuine. Amos, stunned by the resemblance to Carlos, lets him go.

Back at home, Fields—now operating under the alias Jack Shaw—pursues Ramirez and tries to recruit him to impersonate Carlos the Jackal. Ramirez refuses and questions the moral and personal cost of taking on the identity.

Shaw confronts Ramirez with the human cost of Carlos's terrorism by taking him to Bethesda Naval Hospital to see a boy crippled by a Carlos bomb. The visit is meant to push him toward agreeing to the mission. Ramirez remains cautious but is moved by the evidence of Carlos's impact.

Amos and Shaw train Ramirez at a former prison in Canada, focusing on situational awareness and absorbing details of Carlos's life. The training culminates with Carla, one of Carlos's ex-mistresses, teaching Ramirez how to have sex like Carlos. The aim is to fully inhabit Carlos's identity.

The plan centers on convincing the KGB that Carlos has begun selling information to the CIA. Shaw lures Agnieska, a former Carlos lover, to Libya, where Ramirez convinces her of his legitimacy. He discovers she has become an informant for French intelligence, and French agents arrive at their apartment, forcing Ramirez to kill them.

Carlos sends an assassin to kill Agnieska in France and orders him to leave Europe through London. The assassin happens to be at Heathrow Airport at the same time as Ramirez and realizes Ramirez is an impostor after he fails to recognize a code phrase. In a struggle, Amos and the assassin kill each other, and the CIA suspends the operation, with Ramirez returning home.

Ramirez returns home and begins living like Carlos, culminating in a tense, unsettling night with his wife. The next day, at his son's little league game, he confronts another father and nearly kills him. Shaw bails him out of jail, both men already battered by the mission's failure.

That night, Ramirez reveals the mission to his wife, explaining how his life has been entangled with Carlos's identity. She is unsettled by the deception, but Ramirez remains committed to seeing the plan through.

Ramirez and Shaw meet in East Berlin, and the KGB photograph them, assuming Carlos has been turned. In response, the KGB raids Carlos's safe house, but he escapes again, maintaining the danger around the operation.

The chase leads to a confrontation on the banks of the Spree River. Ramirez and Carlos fight while Shaw tries to manage the escalation, saving one by shooting at the other. He realizes too late that he has shot Ramirez, and Carlos slips away.

Back home, a car bomb appears to kill Ramirez and his family, and Shaw attends the funeral. The move seems to mark the end of the immediate threat Carlos posed to them.

In St. Martin, Ramirez receives a news clipping of the bombing with a congratulatory note from Shaw, implying that he staged the killing to liberate the Ramirez family. The line between ally and instrument blurs as the mission stretches credibility.

The long pursuit culminates with Carlos the Jackal being arrested in 1994, ending his era of terror. The film closes on a note of closure for the shadow war that had defined Ramirez and Shaw's lives.