Sorcerer.

Review #2085: Sorcerer.

Cast: 

Roy Scheider (Jackie Scanlon / Juan Dominguez), Bruno Cremer (Victor Manzon / Serrano), Francisco Rabal (Nilo), Amidou (Kassem / Martinez), Ramon Bieri (Corlette), Karl John (Marquez), Peter Capell (Lartigue), Anne-Marie Deschodt (Blanche), and Friedrich von Ledebur (Carlos) Produced and Directed by William Friedkin (#037 - The Exorcist, #1438 - The French Connection, #1477 - To Live and Die in L.A.)

Review: 

"It occurred to me at that time, this was in the middle ’70s, when America had just come through a national nervous breakdown, after the assassinations, the Vietnam war, and it seemed to me—I guess it’s always ever thus—that the world was full of strangers who hated one another, but if they didn’t cooperate, if they didn’t work together in some way, they would blow up. And this film seemed to me to be a metaphor for that idea, which I thought was a valid theme then, and now. I think it’s possibly worse now, with so many countries have weapons of mass destruction. And so, it was the theme that attracted me."

In 1950, French writer Georges Arnaud wrote Le Salaire de la peur. Three years later, it was adapted into The Wages of Fear by director Henri-Georges Clouzot, a multi-language production that starred Yves Montand (this is reflected with Sorcerer, which features subtitles for its non-English vignettes that start the film). After the release of The Exorcist in 1973, William Friedkin was thinking about what he should do next, and he came along with doing a new version of the Arnaud novel (i.e. not a remake), but he approached Clouzot by saying that he would "only use the basic premise and your theme" (which he felt was really a theme of brotherhood) while noting that he tried to get the older film re-released in theaters but no one bought on to it. He then asked Arnaud for the rights to the novel, which were accepted (after Arnaud noted that he actually didn't like Clouzot's film). Friedkin brought in Walon Green (most notably the writer of The Wild Bunch) to serve as writer; creating the outline together, the script by Green was done in a number of months. Believe it or not, the script was written for Steve McQueen. However, Friedkin balked at the idea of writing a role for McQueen's new wife Ali MacGraw (or even making her an associate producer rather than giving her a part) and filming it in America (as opposed to the primary location in the Dominican Republic). The failure of the film distressed Friedkin, which he later called "the only film I've made that I can still watch" while also musing that looking back, he would've probably done what he would have had to do to land McQueen for the lead role. While the film did have a bit of a video release, Friedkin sued Paramount and Universal, who had each claimed they didn't know who owned the film when he asked about it when the former had made a new print for a showing (they had formed a joint corporation to do the aforementioned film that folded long ago, as related by Friedkin in interviews such as this) when it came to wanting to restore a print that could be put on DVD and Blu-ray. Friedkin got his wish and served as one of the supervisors on a restored print (as financed by Warner Bros. with distinctly split distribution rights between Paramount, Warner, and Universal) that came out in 2014. His films afterwards were of varying quality that nevertheless were quite watchable, as evidenced by stuff such as Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), and Bug (2006); Friedkin died in August of 2023, just a month before the festival premiere of his last feature with The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial (2023).

It is easy to see where the end of the line came for films like this came with its release on June 24, 1977...because of the film that came out just a month before (well, you may know it in Star Wars, and the irony is that Friedkin was handed the script when it was making the studio rounds of rejection and he had doubts about it being made). In the end, no one is just anything, and the sorcerer for this film is (as Friedkin put it) fate. It is undoubtedly a wonderful film in tension, filled with such rough and tumble characters that fits now more than ever with such gritty passion. It is captured with the feeling of a documentary, one that happens to have Tangerine Dream (a German electronic band) compose the music to worthwhile effect for a film that is more than just a trail through the jungle with nitroglycerin on the mind. These four people that we are entrusted to view in the prism of the jungle that they inhabit might as well serve as hell. Schneider seemingly reflects the ideas that Green wanted to show in a "desperately human" role, which namely involves a roughly-shaped face and voice that you believe could be your mirror image in the bounds of viewing hell itself. The other players in the games (an assassin, a Palestinian militant, a former banker, and an Irish mobster) that play in fate prove just as well interesting in serving as pawns to toil in the passages of wages and fear. Undoubtedly, the bridge sequence is the showstopper to focus on, not because it serves as the climax or anything, but because of how wonderfully executed and tense it is (the events of how the bridge sequence was staged, which included moving the bridge set piece to Mexico and weird production stories about getting the whole thing done in a matter of months can be found here). It is a sequence that lasts just a bit over ten minutes in an already grimy two-hour runtime but by God does it dominate your attention. If there was any sequence you had to show of the film to try and get someone to at least consider the film, showing even two minutes of it would be more than enough. The sequence right after it, involving a seemingly too tall tree and a good laugh makes for a solid second in the array of interesting sequences of human terror. By the time the film closes off its delirium, you have found a film that has justified its entire reason for being as one filled with edge and style about the dangers that can come with fractured brotherhood on a ticking clock that can fall prey to the whims of fate that reflects how they had set people to their own fate before they reached their reckoning in Columbia. One can only see and hear the ending for what it reflects in what fate means to those who have to endure the choices made (and not made) by oneself. Whether one has seen The Wages of Fear or not when it comes to adaptations of the novel, Sorcerer is a gem you have to experience for yourself with a deep breath and deep admiration for the craftsmanship that is readily apparent in a year that had plenty to go around.

Overall, I give it 9 out of 10 stars.