Wages of Fear

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

I love double features. There's something about pairing movies together by some common theme that always gets me excited. I''m thinking of maybe trying to institute a "Double Feature Monday" or something like that in the near future.

On Wednesday, I did the klassik Wages of Fear in a double feature with the William Friedkin remake Sorcerer. Wages was directed by the fellow that did Diabolique (which, come to think of it, I watched a few years ago in a double feature with the terrible 90's remake), but this one is a lot better. This is a great suspense film about a bunch of guys who have to drive through dangerous terrain in trucks filled with nitroglycerin. One false move, and boom.

I think the movie is intended to have a political message, but what really comes across is a surprising amount of nihilism. You don't see that in movies much (at least, not as much as I'd like). It's all suspense and buildup, with a kind of road to nowhere ending. I think my favorite touch is when two major characters die offscreen. You get the gist how they died, but never exactly how it happened. The surviving characters just end up brushing it off and moving on.

One flaw? I like the guy who plays the main character in this, but Frenchmen do not make convincing tough guys. He even has a neckerchief he wears the whole time. Yeesh.