“The Wages of Fear” The genius William Friedkin’s greatest yet tragic masterpiece

*Information as of December 2018 article publication.

"Wages of Fear" synopsis

A huge fire breaks out at an oil well deep in South America. Four criminals who were forced to leave their homeland and moved there agree to transport nitroglycerin, a fire extinguisher that can cause a huge explosion with the slightest impact, in exchange for a ``reward'' of $10,000 each. The men, riding in two trucks, head 300 kilometers deep into the jungle along a roadless road to the fire site, but what fate awaits them...

Index

• Compared with the original and not getting a fair rating
• How did the genius Friedkin come to film ``The Wages of Fear''?
• Realism created with the know-how cultivated through documentaries
• Encounter of two magicians

Compared with the original and not getting a fair rating

When I was in high school (early 1990s), ``Wages of Fear'' (1977) was suddenly released on VHS, and I got it at a video rental store and watched it obsessively. I was overwhelmed by the profound drama of four men transporting nitroglycerin, which explodes on impact, 300 kilometers away by truck. A few months later, I had a chance to talk to a film official and when I told him how deeply moved I was by The Wages of Fear, he declared, "It still doesn't compare to Clouzot's original version."

It was then that I learned for the first time that director William Friedkin's ``The Wages of Fear'' was a remake of French master Henri-Georges Clouzot's `` The Wages of Fear '' (1953), even though I was still new to film. . After that, I watched the original (though I don't remember if I watched the whole thing properly...) I still have a strong preference for Friedkin's version. However, due to a combination of the public's tendency to place more emphasis on originals and the unfortunate circumstances surrounding its release, the film has long been subject to unfair reviews.

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When it was first released in 1977, the world was in the midst of a Star Wars (1977) boom, and ``The Wages of Fear,'' set in South America and featuring only men covered in sweat, blood, and mud, was a commercial success. suffered a crushing defeat. Therefore, when screening the film overseas, the distributor re-edited it without Friedkin's permission, reducing the 121-minute North American version to 92 minutes. Perhaps for that reason, the box office performance here in Japan was 110 million yen, which was not very good at all. Many critics compared the work to Clouzot's original, and the work was repeatedly released into software and out of print, and even in Japan it was not possible to see the complete version for a long time.

In 2012, that situation was reversed. Friedkin filed a lawsuit to revive the film, which had been sealed off for a long time due to complicated rights issues, and got Warner to agree to pay for the restoration. The original complete version was created with 4K digital remastering, and premiered at the Venice International Film Festival in 2013, followed by screenings in LA, London, and Cannes, spreading the ``Wages of Fear'' fever around the world. And this year, 40 years after its first release, Friedkin's version of ``The Wages of Fear'' has finally been revived on Japanese screens (I would like to express my gratitude to the people at King Records who negotiated the distribution! ). Movie fans should now fully immerse themselves in the bliss of seeing this work on screen.

"Wages of Fear" preview

How did the genius Friedkin come to film ``The Wages of Fear''?