Boring

Best movie of this year hands down!

A Disappointing Continuation

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

A terrible, forgettable film chronicling the last days of Leon Trotsky's exile in Mexico City. The story could have had great potential: The time, the place, the characters. Rather it fails to exploit any of these assets. Making the film tedious and dull. Winning dialogue that is meaningless, explains nothing, and is just plain dull is the norm here as for example when Trotsky's wife asks the Delon character why a Belgian should have a name like Jacson and Delon explains, it's because he's French-Canadian. The film is not anti-Stalin, Pro-Trotsky, actually it's not much of anything. We learn nothing about the characters: Who they were and what motivated their actions. Nor do we learn anything about the time period and what was taking place in Mexico. Sadly, the film has no historical value,because of this. Lacking character development, we never learn how these casts of characters came to Mexico or what motivates them. There is no mention of Trotsky starting a 4th International here. No mention of the affair the married Trotsky had with Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera's wife in Rivera's own house which angered Rivera beyond belief and which devastated Trotsky's wife. And lastly no mention of the painter David Siqueiros, involvement in spraying Trotsky's house with bullets. Alain Delon is stiff like a board. Richard Burton hardly looks like Trotsky. The goatee he is wearing looks like it should be returned to the horse whose tail it was misappropriated from. His acting seems to only run the gamut from A to B. True it's an improvement from Delon's who never manages to get beyond A, but not by much. Only Schneider was able to give enough color to her character to make her come alive. While Trotsky is depicted as an egoist who likes to hear himself talk, Jacson is portrayed as an ice-cold killer as shown by his affectionless affair with Ms. Schneider and his unflinching ability to watch a very brutal bull-fight: A scene certainly not for the faint at heart. The real Mercador (aka Jacson) was a dedicated idealistic Spanish Communist who fought and was willing to die in defense of the Spanish Republic in Spain's Revolutionary War against Franco and the Fascists. After serving his 20 year sentence for Trotsky's murder, he moved to Cuba. Although a great idealist, who was willing to spend the rest of his life in jail by killing Trotsky for his role in betraying the Spanish Republic, you would never know this from the film. Rather Losey seems to describe his motivation as stemming, not from idealism, but from some sort of sense of existential emptiness. Huh? How is this historically accurate or for that matter any of the film?

a film of controversies. because it could be better. or because it uses , in not the most inspired manner, good actors. for atmosphere. for realistic details of story. for the status of history lesson, useful for understand the essence of a life and struggle and cruel idealism. Richard Burton is not the best option for the role of Trotsky. but , not surprising, he does a decent job. Alain Delon seems be on the thin ice. but his performance, version of empty soul character, is far to be bad. Romy Schneider is herself one of the virtues of film, only for her presence. "The Assassination of Trotsky" is one of films who has all opportunities to be easily criticized. if you ignore its message. because, more than a historical film, it is a warning. and, maybe, this must be the start point for see it.

This film has a reputation as a terrible film which I find greatly undeserved. It is average in the sense there are better films and there are worse. I found the film to be fairly static. The story is slow moving and the character of the assassin is never really delineated. Alain Delon is the true lead of the film, with Burton's Trotsky more a secondary character. I thought Burton did a fine job as Trotsky, the only think slightly bothering me is that Burton was physically imposing and that's not how I picture Trotsky. I picture him as more of a bookish intellectual of less than physically imposing attributes. (I do not know the actual physical attributes of Trotsky.) In any case, Romy Schneider is very lovely and sexy and the camera also treats Delon well, even if we do not have any clear insight to his motivation. In the end, I'm not sure what the purpose of this film was and that is its greatest failure. But, while the film did not succeed, there is nothing memorably bad about it. So my rating falls plum in the middle.

To sum it up in one sentence: A forgettable movie, but a forgivable mistake.Losey. Burton. Delon. Schneider. Cortese. Trotsky. A bunch of great names, thrown into the depths of a weak script that wants to be both, a history lesson and an entertaining political thriller. Shot on location in Mexico and Rome, this European co-production was groomed for international success and turned out to be a devastating disappointment for everyone involved. The audience couldn't cope with it and stayed away, the critics weren't impressed.The film chronicles the last days of Trotzky (Richard Burton) as a political refugee in Mexico City. Alain Delon tries to play Frank Jacson, a Belgian traveling on a Canadian passport, who murders the dedicated Marxist and atheist.It is only for a few precious moments that you can partially perceive Losey's talent which he has proved elsewhere (i.e. in "The Servant", "A Doll's House" or "Accident"), and Delon's performance is vain and unconvincing. (The English language clearly overdrew the actor's abilities.) The Losey/Delon team did much better a couple of years later with "Monsieur Klein".