I've often heard of Clouzot referred to as the 'French Hitchcock' although this film seems to share more of a cousin hood with the work of John Houston.
Wages of Fear is about how a bunch of immigrants in Latin America, for money, take on the reckless task of transporting a large consignment of explosive nitroglycerin across 300-miles of obstacle-riddled paths, every moment aware that a single concussion could ignite the entire shipment, blowing them all to bits.
The film begins with the setting of the locale and introduction of its principal characters - the regular irregulars Mario and Luigi (just realized the striking similarity to Nintendo's famous plumber duo, hmm), the mafioso type new entrant Jo who strikes up a friendship with the raffish Mario becoming his mentor but antagonizes the rest of the townsfolk with his bossy attitude, Mario's mistress Linda who naively worships him but is in turn kept as a pleasure item. The town is a dead-end rife with poverty and unemployment, its only industry being the Southern Oil Corporation (SOC) a Yankee enterprise. The residents are too demoralized to even consider escape to better climes. Like Mario explains to Jo in the course of a brilliantly spliced sequence of jump-cuts that covers the entire aspect of the town, "It's like prison. Easy to get in, but escape is impossible."
A major fire at the oil-wells calls for immediate shipment of explosive to isolate the blaze, but it's too late to bring in the specialized transportation. The company offers a payment of $2000 each for 4 locals who will carry the hazardous shipment in ordinary trucks. Mario, Jo, Luigi and a Jew Bimba take on the job, the promise of money to help them escape from the town sufficient even to temporarily offset the fear of death. Thus begins the arduous, tension-ridden journey that occupies most of this 148-min film. The trucks must move above a certain minimum speed to minimize vibrations (a ruse reused in 1994's Speed). On the way they face various blocks including a rickety wooden bridge the trucks must back up over. Mid-journey one of the trucks blows up. Mario and Jo who are in the other truck must overcome their horror at the catastrophe and cross further hurdles including a lake of oil created by the bursting of a pipeline.
In the course of the journey we see a reversal in the roles of Jo and Mario. Initially Mario looks up to Jo, in awe of his cool and worldly-wise manner. But Jo is soon revealed to be in reality a scared old man for whom Mario has only a contemptuous pity. This character drama makes for engrossing viewing and in no small measure due to the excellent performances, especially Charles Vanel as Jo.
The story moves smoothly thanks to very precise cutting, and some of the nighttime photography, as also the scene at the oil lake, is worth mentioning. Clouzot obviously has a sure hand over the bulk of the proceedings although he slips up in a couple of places: The oil company is portrayed in a rather ham-fisted (and badly acted) way as this evil uncaring monolith that would gladly blame dead employees for disasters to avoid compensation and resort to thoroughly unethical means to get its job done. Most of the supporting characters are cardboard. Also, some of the miniature work is painfully obvious, although that'd be likely a limitation of technical facilities available to the crew. The ending of the film is finely executed but seems all too contrived to give you your daily dose of irony.
In the end, this remains a taut and finger-licking good old-school thriller, which bothers to provide characters interesting enough for us to care about their life and death.
Wages of Fear is about how a bunch of immigrants in Latin America, for money, take on the reckless task of transporting a large consignment of explosive nitroglycerin across 300-miles of obstacle-riddled paths, every moment aware that a single concussion could ignite the entire shipment, blowing them all to bits.
The film begins with the setting of the locale and introduction of its principal characters - the regular irregulars Mario and Luigi (just realized the striking similarity to Nintendo's famous plumber duo, hmm), the mafioso type new entrant Jo who strikes up a friendship with the raffish Mario becoming his mentor but antagonizes the rest of the townsfolk with his bossy attitude, Mario's mistress Linda who naively worships him but is in turn kept as a pleasure item. The town is a dead-end rife with poverty and unemployment, its only industry being the Southern Oil Corporation (SOC) a Yankee enterprise. The residents are too demoralized to even consider escape to better climes. Like Mario explains to Jo in the course of a brilliantly spliced sequence of jump-cuts that covers the entire aspect of the town, "It's like prison. Easy to get in, but escape is impossible."
A major fire at the oil-wells calls for immediate shipment of explosive to isolate the blaze, but it's too late to bring in the specialized transportation. The company offers a payment of $2000 each for 4 locals who will carry the hazardous shipment in ordinary trucks. Mario, Jo, Luigi and a Jew Bimba take on the job, the promise of money to help them escape from the town sufficient even to temporarily offset the fear of death. Thus begins the arduous, tension-ridden journey that occupies most of this 148-min film. The trucks must move above a certain minimum speed to minimize vibrations (a ruse reused in 1994's Speed). On the way they face various blocks including a rickety wooden bridge the trucks must back up over. Mid-journey one of the trucks blows up. Mario and Jo who are in the other truck must overcome their horror at the catastrophe and cross further hurdles including a lake of oil created by the bursting of a pipeline.
In the course of the journey we see a reversal in the roles of Jo and Mario. Initially Mario looks up to Jo, in awe of his cool and worldly-wise manner. But Jo is soon revealed to be in reality a scared old man for whom Mario has only a contemptuous pity. This character drama makes for engrossing viewing and in no small measure due to the excellent performances, especially Charles Vanel as Jo.
The story moves smoothly thanks to very precise cutting, and some of the nighttime photography, as also the scene at the oil lake, is worth mentioning. Clouzot obviously has a sure hand over the bulk of the proceedings although he slips up in a couple of places: The oil company is portrayed in a rather ham-fisted (and badly acted) way as this evil uncaring monolith that would gladly blame dead employees for disasters to avoid compensation and resort to thoroughly unethical means to get its job done. Most of the supporting characters are cardboard. Also, some of the miniature work is painfully obvious, although that'd be likely a limitation of technical facilities available to the crew. The ending of the film is finely executed but seems all too contrived to give you your daily dose of irony.
In the end, this remains a taut and finger-licking good old-school thriller, which bothers to provide characters interesting enough for us to care about their life and death.