THE WAGES OF FEAR

New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 815, 11 March 1955, Page 20

THE WAGES OF FEAR

(Filmsonor-Films de France) HATEVER else you may say about the film version of Georges Arnaud’s "novel of suspense" it is certainly sus-penseful-it could hardly be more so. All those with weak hearts should stay away. The other obvious thing about it is that it takes a very dim view of the human experiment. Here the director, Henri-Georges Clouzot, who has already shocked us with Le Corbeau and Manon, is in his element, and in a rather exciting way he wallows in it. It’s an outlook for which I can feel some sympathy though not, I’m afraid, very much admiration. The story, set in Central America, is already pretty well known through the book or the widely broadcast BBC version. A large quantity of nitro-glycerine is needed to put out a blazing oil well, and for a reward of 1000 dollars apiece four hard-up, desperate men undertake to drive two truckloads of it over 300 miles of bad roads, where the tropical heat or a sudden jolt might blow them sky high. In a film which runs for over

two hours, M. Clouzot takes rather a long time to set the scene, though I must say this early part is fascinating enough, and in its way as ‘brilliantly done as the rest; and it includes at least one scene-a trial of strength between two of the principals-which claws briefly at the nerye ends and provides an interesting contrast with the sort of courage they are to need when the hazardous journey begins. The main characters are two Frenchmen, Jo and Mario, who meet in the festering little town where the story opens. Yves Montand, who plays Mario, has already been seenvhere as a talented actor in Les Portes de Ya Nuit; but I think Charles Vanel, as Jo, will be longest remembered from this film as a study in courage and fear. Contrasted with these two are Foico Lulli as Luigi, a likeable Italian, and Peter van Eyck as Bimba, a German refugee who is the hero of one of the big scenes when a rock has to be blasted out of the way. — The aftermath of this incident, by the way, provides about the only really human moment of the film. Others of importance are Vera Clouzot (the director’s wife) as Mario’s girl friend, and William Tubbs (he was the Catholic

chaplain in Paisa) as the tough American boss who sets the assignment. The real stars of the film, however, are M. Clouzot himself and his cameraman, Armand Thirard, who was with him also on Manon; for it’s as a piece of

film-making that The Wages of Fear achieves something like greatness. The early part, I’ve said, is well done, but once the trucks are on the road scene after scene is startling in its imaginative use of camera angles and movement, its

cutting from sh@t to shot and at times its sheer invention. To take one instance, I doubt whether the cinema has ever seen anything more tense than the incident when the big truck has to be backed on to some timberwork to negotiate a sharp bend-it’s hard te believe it’s all done with little more than a camera and a pair of scissors. The sound throughout is also extraordinarily effective. On the other hand I’m not sure that we. could not have been spared some of the sheer horror of the later scenes Which concern the fate of Jo. Nevertheless, when all has been. said that could be said about its shocking and frightening"aspects and its director’s view of life, The Wages of Fear remains, as cinema, a remarkable piece of work.