Now this is a movie! Movies, like coffee, are supposed to be black... well, black and white to be exact :) Despite being an antique almost (released in 1952) this movie has it all: well defined characters, a story, great acting, beautiful shots and superb directing!Henri-Georges Clouzot creates a masterpiece with the help of a few great actors. A cast led by Yves Montand (Mario) but with equally beautiful play from Charles Vanel (M. Jo), Peter van Eyck (Bimba) and especially Folco Lulli (Luigi).
The image of the little south-american boy playing in the dirt, in the opening sequences of the movie, must be one of the best in film history. Equally great are the sequences with Bimba pouring the nitroglycerin to blow up the rock blocking the road or the slow drowning of M. Jo in oil, while Mario was driving his truck over his leg.
Maybe more beautiful and sensible than the actual nitroglycerin journey itself is the introduction into the movie. The characters are explained nicely, their strengths and weaknesses exposed, the situation in which they are is made clear. The only surprise is the ambivalence of M. Jo and the courage of Luigi, gloriously left for latter by Clouzot.
Overall Clouzot does a great job, the close-ups on the eyes of the drivers are a graphic delight, emphasizing the sensation of fear and anticipation. The eminence of disaster is felt close by, without any special effects, without colossal explosions, without hundreds of liters of fake blood and millions of bullets.
Yves Montand character is great: a child macho that is tough with women yet carries around, like his most important valuable, a ticket from the Paris metro.
Charles Vanel plays M. Jo, a recycled gangster from the Paris ill famed neighborhoods, quite tough on the outside, yet easy to crack when faced with the real danger of getting blown into little pieces.
Then there is Luigi, the cliche Italian construction worker of which France of full before the war, the only one in the whole gang that has a stable job. He clubs around Mario, enjoying his easy going attitude, but never so much as to repeat it himself. He handles the crazy drive of the nitroglycerin truck with the same attitude displayed in his daily routine. He is a hero by accident without even knowing so. And he dies together with Bimba, they disappear from the film like they never were, two more victims on the road to hell.
The end of the movie is sad, short and previsible. But so it is real life. The happy ending of Mario getting back to Linda and living happily ever after is a lot more adequate to Hollywood type of movies. Exactly the type that Clouzot refused his whole life to make.
P.S.: William Friedkin made a remake of the movie in 1977, Sorcerer. Well, don't! I mean don't waste your time and precious internet bandwidth to download and watch this movie. Or if it is mandatory that you do, at least please see it before the original. Otherwise you'll never get to finish watching it! BTW, the Sorcerer is great by itself: casts Roy Scheider and got a Oscar nomination, but it just cannot stay next to Le salaire de la peur.
P.P.S.: do you know a lot of movies with a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes?! Well, here is one!
