Olivier Assayas's Carlos is long but worth every minute. Édgar Ramírez plays the famous terrorist...

Édgar Ramírez, however, does not look like the famous terrorist. The actor is pretty; the real terrorist has an average appearance. And what the film most wants to capture is not terrorism but an erotics of terrorism. In this way, Carlos is spiritual: its about the way terrorists perceive themselves (desirable, vital, carnal, "naked and famous") and not about themselves as themselves (clumsy, awkward, lonely, desperate, needy). The erotic is the soul of sex.