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Wages of Fear
Special delivery
1953
Review: December 29, 2008
Director: Henri-Georges Clouzot
Starring: Yves Montand, Charles Vanel, Folco Lulli, Peter van Eyck, Véra Clouzot
If you like.
THE SETUP:
Four layabouts are hired to transport several pounds of nitroglycerine over many miles of crap road.
DISCUSSION:
This was playing as part of Film Forum’s series of French crime films, and it’s written and directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot, best known for Les Diaboliques [not the Sharon Stone one, silly], and is supposed to be a nerve-shredding suspense extravaganza. So onto my list it went.
Our first shot if of four cockroaches struggling in the dirt, all attached to a string held by a little boy. I think you can tell that this is highly symbolic. We then meet some of our main characters, who are these French layabouts malingering in Central America. Chief among them of Yves Montand as Mario, loitering on the porch of this bar. He and his buds are ordered to move on, but they’re so poor they have nothing to lose, and don’t take any crap from anyone. Mario has a flirtation with Linda, played by the director’s wife, Véra Clouzot, who was also in Les Diaboliques.
Soon this guy Mr. Jo arrives. He announces his wealth by wearing a white suit and spreading his money around. Because he is the only rich person in town [and he doesn’t even have THAT much money, it’s just that the town is destitute], everyone defers to him and his presence shifts the sociology of the entire place. Mario latches onto him, and for a while Jo is talking as though he’s going to bring Mario in on some deal or other, which causes Mario to turn against people he used to be more friendly with and tell Linda he has no time for her whenever Jo snaps his fingers.
There is this other fellow Luigi, who they are considering bringing into their plan because he’s “a real dope,” in Mario’s words. One day Jo gets his suit dirty, so Mario gives him Luigi’s. This pisses Luigi off. That night, he comes down in a nice suit and orders champagne for everybody, turning on the music—all of which is an attempt to wrest control of the bar back from Mr. Jo. It escalates into a good, tense showdown that I wouldn’t dare ruin for you.
Meanwhile, the only people pulling in any money are the American oil company—the one that pays the locals pitiful wages and throws them away when they get injured. Anyway, they figure they’ll hire these “tramps” to drive trucks loaded with nitroglycerine to their oil field. The truck with have to be driven with the greatest smoothness and precision, for one little jolt and they’ll explode. All the expected characters are chosen: Mario, Luigi, Bimba [a big blond character we’ve met earlier], and after some hugger-mugger, Mr. Jo. They have a few hours before they leave, during which Linda begs Mario not to go. If they deliver their payload and make it back, they’ll be paid $2,000 each, a huge, life-changing amount to them.
SPOILERS > > >
So they take off, driving extremely slowly. Bimba and Luigi are driving together, and so are Jo and Mario. Soon into the trip, Jo starts getting sick, and wants to stop. The other truck passes them. Then Jo has to wait until he finishes his cigarette. Luigi and Bimba come to a sharp turn in the road, which is going to require them to go out onto a rickety construction platform with no back railing, but they make it. You might have had the feeling that maybe Jo is just a coward, now that he’s faced with real and very nerve-wracking danger, and you’d be sure when you see him leave Mario to handle the truck on the shaky platform, and run up the hill away from him. There are a bunch of other suspense sequences, and I’ll leave the rest of the movie and its surprises for you to discover.
< < < SPOILERS END
I was REALLY into the first hour and the whole setting of the scene and the very interesting changes that occur as Mr. Jo comes in and his presence shifts the balance in this destitute little town. To my surprise, however, I found the whole driving suspense sequences, mentioned by most people are the stunning, main contribution of the movie, to be fairly dull and certainly MUCH less interesting. I suppose the primary reason for this is that, in the intervening years, all of these tricks for creating suspense have been absorbed into the mainstream and become old hat, so they seemed like just so much “generic suspense” to me, while the intriguing character dynamics of the first half were fascinating. I know, I’m a philistine. It also annoyed me, and seriously deflated my tension, how they kept slamming the truck doors without a thought and without any consequence.
Don’t get me wrong, I can tell that this is very well-done suspense and I appreciate how the characters continue to evolve throughout. And, truth be told, I wasn’t wowed by Les Diaboliques the first time I saw it [or the second time]. But for me, the “interesting character development” part was RIVETING and the “riveting suspense part” was… a little toward the boring.
SHOULD YOU WATCH IT?
Definitely, although it may underwhelm you just a tiny bit.
