Linkshoch Wonderful Movie

Bea Swanson This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Sabah Hensley This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Benas Mcloughlin Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

riles-14932 Save 2.2 hours and watch something else. For such a high review, this movie sucked. The biggest problem is that it kept telling us about more interesting events happening off screen that would have been great scenes. Told about an explosion, told about one of the characters narrowly escaping a country, told about locals dying, told about some dude dying. I kept waiting for the action and tension described in the movie summary, but it never happened. It's been 5 minutes since I stopped at the 50 minute mark, and I'm already forgetting the characters and the movie. Not a classic by any mark. Doesn't even stand up to classic movies of the era.

grantss In a remote South American town, four men are hired by an American oil company to transport two truckloads of nitroglycerin to an oil field, to put out a fire. It's a very hazardous task - the nitroglycerin can explode for the slightest reason, the road is treacherous and the journey is a long one. However, the money is very good and their current situation in the town is rather dire - they will do anything to improve their situation. Great thriller-drama by French director HG Clouzot. Starts slowly and even once the hazardous journey is in progress, it doesn't seem that brilliant. However, Clouzot builds the tension and from a point it is absolutely nail-biting stuff. The scene with the boulder has to be one of the most tense movie scenes I've watched in my life. A good character-drama too - the way the characters develop and the relationships between the four change adds a new dimension to the drama and makes for very engaging viewing.Not perfect though. Some events and plot devices don't make much sense, though aren't crucial to the movie. The ending felt quite silly and contrived. A similar result but with a more plausible, less predictable, less stupid way of getting there would have seen the movie get a perfect score.

thejcowboy22 When I think of an Yves Montand Movie it usually takes place in a cosmopolitan city surrounded by handsomely dressed people and exquisite sets. I picture the dashing Frenchman Yves with a cigarette, fancy suit, neat, polished surrounded by lovely starlets singing a song or two Yves mostly plays roles that fit a man of importance, a man of distinction, for example Yves would depict a Doctor, executive, movie mogul, college professor, newscaster, Military Captain or a Baron. Yves represents elegance in Foreign and American films. Wages of Fear is down right tense, disturbing, dirty and gritty from start to finish. Our story starts in a rural village somewhere in a remote section of South America. It's not quite clear where this place is which has me intrigued from the start.The towns people spoke French which I felt a gaze of wonderment. In addition to the remoteness of this town the only way back to France is the airport because the roads are dangerous. Passing deserted jungles and deserts along the way. Narrow roads protruding over cliffs make any journey heart wrenching to say the least.Our picture starts with four men. Frenchman Mario (Yves Montand) and his friend Jo (Charles Vanel). A German fellow named Bimba (Peter Van Eyck) and Italian Luigi (Folco Lulli). Work is hard to come by because this remote town is run by a corrupt American corporation SOC Southern Oil Corporation.This company is suspected of unethical practices, mainly exploiting worker and taking the law into it's own hands. The townspeople except the hardships anyway. Montand plays a gruff Corsican playboy who abuses his girlfriend Linda (Vera Clouzot) with contempt. His buddy Jo was an ex-con who feels stranded in this out of the way town. Bimba is an intense quiet man who worked in salt mine for six long years. Mario's close friend is Jo who talks about the old days when they both lived in Paris. Luigi has developed serious health issues due to collecting cement dust in his lungs. Meanwhile Jo feeling stranded is quick tempered with the other cantina regulars. Meanwhile a massive fire breaks out at an SOC Oil field some 500 kilometers from their town. Non unionized SOC truck drivers are needed to deliver nitroglycerin in two large barrels over rough terrain to quash the out of control flames. A perfect example of the company exploiting the locals into a dangerous situation for employment. The company institutes a lottery for applicants and The four men I mentioned previously where picked. A fellow by the name of Smerloff was originally picked but doesn't show so Jo takes that spot. A few years earlier Jo did some curry-favor with the American SOC foreman Bill O'Brien (William Tubbs) when they delivered illegal booze on the side. Jo shows signs of getting weak possibly local malaria and O'Brien partners him with Mario on this hazardous journey into the wilderness. The other two will drive the second truck 30 minutes behind Mario. Luigi and Bimba suspect that Jo murdered Smerloff to take that spot. So far this flick was only in French with English sub-titled and then the movie inverts to a brief English portion of the film as the SOC foreman Bill O'Brien lays down the plan and explains the nature of this dangerous mission to Non union four carrying liquid explosive. Paying each driver $2000.00 if they survive the journey to the oil fields. Driving ever so slowly through desolate areas over every obstacle imaginable. Director Henri Clouzot takes you along for one of the most suspenseful rides of your life. You feel the thirst and fever of our characters as at any moment their dreams would end in one huge explosion. Being stuck in an L.A. freeway traffic snarl or a flat tire on a rainy night would be an improvement as to what our men are faced with. The physical and mental anguish of the South American Back country. The cinematography places you riding shotgun, as every bump, precipice, pot hole ridden narrow road for at any moment one mistake and obliteration. I also viewed this movie as an Anti-American film. Big corporation taken advantage of the little town. I just felt for Mario and his chance to possibly start over again. A round about way of playing Russian roulette with Barrels of Nitro in the back just waiting to explode. I was mentally exhausted by films end. As was said by one of the Company men sending our poor souls off to the flamed oil fields,"I used to see men go off on these kinds of jobs... and not come back. When they did their hair turned white and their hands were shaky like palsy. You don't know what fear is but it's catching. Catching like small pox! Once you get it it's for life. So long Boys and Good Luck!" I gave this melodrama a medium grade of five barrels of Nitro.

avik-basu1889 The film starts off with a setting which is very reminiscent of the opening to Huston's 'Treasure of Sierra Madre' in the way that we meet a number of Europeans stuck in a South American town where literally nothing happens. They have no job prospects and they don't have the financial means required to leave the deadbeat town. Although the opening act of the film is a bit uneven,it still works to make the viewer well acquainted with the characters. Henri- Georges Clouzot manages to convey the utter disenchantment and poverty of the characters, which helps to underline why these men would feel desperate to find a way out of this town and will probably go to any lengths to materialise that. There is also a very clear anti-American capitalism statement being made in the opening act. The Southern Oil Company(SOC) who end up employing the men for the central mission is portrayed as this monstrously exploitative entity that doesn't care about people's lives as long as their materialistic oil needs are met. It is also interesting to note that the characters themselves remain pretty unlikable in the first part of the film. But when the come together in their mission and as we spend time with them on the road and fear for their lives, they become more and more engaging.As soon as the 4 primary characters jump on the trucks and start the mission, the film completely changes. It becomes a fascinatingly exciting, edge of the seat thrill-fest as the characters encounter and overcome a series of obstacles. This was my first viewing of a Clouzot film, but I can clearly see why he was nicknamed the 'French Hitchcock'. Clouzot's tour de force direction in each of these obstacle sequences is very reminiscent of Hitchcock. He ratchets up the tension through a combination of various elements like meticulous use of silence and ambient noises, precise camera placement and absolutely pitch perfect editing. I think every single person watching this film will at at least some point or another find themselves on the edge of the seat during the film due to the sheer effectiveness of the white-knuckle-ride experience that ' The Wages of Fear' offers.A clear theme that is being explored in the film is the irony and the mysterious ways of the concept of fate and mortality. The manner in which all the characters meet their respective fates in the film are genuinely unpredictable, sudden and unquestionably ironic.In conclusion, 'The Wages of Fear' is a must watch for everyone as it has something to offer for fans of a wide range of genres. Even though I think the opening act is comparatively a little uneven, however in an overall sense, the film is a knockout and has directorial mastery written all over it. Highly Recommended.