Sorcerer (1977) - YouTube

Director William Friedkin was coming off two films that a) had won Best Picture (The French Connection) and b) had become the third highest grossing movie ever (The Exorcist) when he decided to remake Henri-George Clouzot's masterful The Wages of Fear, updating it to the 70s and focusing even more on the tyranny of Western corporations in the developing world.

This was enough of a flop on release to derail Friedkin's career, partly due to his obnoxiousness and intransigence when it came to the studio, but mostly because it was blown out of the water by Star Wars, which was released just two weeks before ("It made our film look like this little, amateurish piece of shit," according to producer Bud Smith). But Sorcerer has picked up a huge cult following since, particularly in the last two or three years, and I'm curious to see how it stacks up to the original.

The plot, you say? Four men, each with grizzled pasts, are trapped in a poverty-stricken Latin American village without the means or money to leave, when they are made a proposition by an American oil company. They must drive two trucks of aged, unstable nitroglycerin across the country, over bumpy, rickety roads so that it can be used to plug an exploding oil well. In return, they will get enough money to leave... if they survive. And the tension keeps ratcheting up and up and up.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BDbIzovuos

As ever, we rendezvous online at 7.45pm, press play together at 8 and chat through a WhatsApp group, the link for which will go up with the film link half an hour before. Don't be late, don't no show!