Georges Arnaud's novel LE SALAIRE DE LA PEUR has been filmed twice, by Henri-Georges Clouzot as THE WAGES OF FEAR (1953) and by William Friedkin as SORCERER (1977). While both films are worth seeing, the earlier version is the one regarded as a classic, and rightly so. SORCERER has its strengths, to be sure -- but the title isn't one of them, in my opinion. "Sorcerer" is the name of one of the trucks used in the antiheroes' nitroglycerin run, but I suspect it was used as the title primarily to make fans of Friedkin's EXORCIST think it was another supernatural chiller. If anything, SORCERER harks back to Friedkin's Oscar-winning FRENCH CONNECTION, having been filmed in the style of the grim-and-gritty school of 1970s crime thrillers; its realism in this respect gives its best moments the feel of a tough-minded documentary. The acting is top-notch all around, particularly from Bruno Cremer and the ever-charismatic Roy Scheider, who brought to my mind Humphrey Bogart in TREASURE OF THE SIERRA MADRE. Having said that, although SORCERER goes into more detail about the political climate and the various misdeeds that led the four desperate protagonists to the South American hellhole where they accept high-paying but life-risking jobs driving nitroglycerin through treacherous terrain, WAGES... distinguishes the men's personalities better, giving the audience more rooting interest in them. Both films have excellent casts, with compelling lead performances from Scheider and, in WAGES..., Yves Montand. In addition, WAGES... provides feminine charm in the form of beguiling Vera Clouzot as the café waitress who loves Montand, while the few women in SORCERER are virtually interchangeable. Both films also have tense action sequences, but somehow for all the staging and skillful editing, SORCERER's action scenes seem strangely slow, slogging along in the mud just like the men in their less-than-state-of-the-art trucks. Both versions have enough good things in them to be worth a look, but if you only have the time and resources to check out one of them, WAGES... pays off more handsomely than SORCERER.
