Sorcerer ** (1977, Roy Scheider, Bruno Cremer, Francisco Rabal, Amidou, Ramon Bieri) – Classic Movie Review 4507

William Friedkin’s 1977 box-office flop American remake of the 1953 French classic thriller The Wages of Fear is an extravagant and sometimes impressive movie. Roy Scheider makes a useful hero, but Sorcerer is not a patch on the revered original.

Director William Friedkin’s 1977 box-office flop American remake of the 1953 Henri-Georges Clouzot French classic thriller The Wages of Fear (La Salaire du Peur) is a spectacularly extravagant and sometimes impressive, but mostly sluggish and uninvolving movie.

The stark story about four guys on the run driving a lorry full of dangerous nitro-glycerine along a risky South American jungle road still exercises a firm grip and Roy Scheider makes a useful hero and is a strong star presence. But Sorcerer [retitled The Wages of Fear in the UK] is not a patch on the justly revered original.

Surprisingly, director Friedkin’s work here is quite clumsy and nervy, oddly so for such an accomplished film-maker. It is accompanied by a weird electronic score Tangerine Dream, which may not be to all tastes, but at least it is very striking and unusual.

The screenplay by Walon Green is based on the novel La Salaire de la Peur by Georges Arnaud. Friedkin says it is a new film of the book rather than a remake of the 1954 film. Produced by Film Properties International, the film was released by Universal in the US and Paramount internationally. It was shot by John M Stephens and Dick Bush, produced by William Friedkin and Bud S Smith, and designed by John Box.

The British, that is the international, version is bizarrely cut by half an hour (from 121 minutes to 92 minutes) and cuts the many flashbacks, but at least it keeps to the original Fifties title.

The film-makers’ first choice as star of Steve McQueen walked away as star when Friedkin refused also to cast his then wife, Ali MacGraw, as co-star. It really turned out to be doomed project. If McQueen had starred it might have been a hit and could have been remembered. The movies are full of so many might-have-beens. Also its timing was unlucky as it got buried in the wake of being released just after Star Wars.

Also in the film are Bruno Cremer, Francisco Rabal, Amidou, Ramon Bieri, Peter Capell, Karl John, Frederick Ledebur [Friedrich von Ledebur], Chico Martînez. Joe Spinell, Rosarîo Almontes, Richard Holley, Anne-Marie Deschott, Jean-Luc Bideau, Jacques François, André Falcon, Gerard Murphy, Desmond Crofton, Henry Diamond, Ray Dittrich, Frank Gio, Randy Jurgensen, Cosmo Allegretti, and Nick Discenza.

Planned for a modest $2.5 million budget, it became a much bigger production, budgeted at $15 million, escalating to $22 million through a troubled shoot with problems arising through various difficult filming locations, mainly in the Dominican Republic, and conflicts between director and crew. It took just $5.9 million in the US, and, after recutting only just over $3 million more overseas, for a total of $9 million at box offices worldwide.

Eventually, after a lawsuit with the studios, Friedkin was able to start supervising a digital restoration, with the new print premiered at the 70th Venice International Film Festival on 29 August 2013 and released on Blu-ray on 22 April 2014. This has allowed the film to enjoy a critical re-evaluation upwards. Friedkin agrees it is the most personal and difficult film he has made and considers it the favourite of his movies.

The 4k restoration of the film, which has not been seen in the UK for years, is released back into cinemas and onto Blu-ray for the first time in November 2017.

William Friedkin (August 29, 1935 – August 7, 2023) is the Oscar-winning director of The French Connection (1971) and the Oscar-nominated director of The Exorcist (1973).

His other films include The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky’s (1968), The Boys in the Band (1970), Sorcerer (1977), The Brink’s Job (1978), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in LA (1985), Bug (2006) and Killer Joe (2011).

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 4,507

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com