Review of The Wages of Fear (1953) by Sunny S — 05 Mar 2010

Four desperate drivers sign up to transport cargo across rocky, rickety, slippery, utterly precarious terrain. The cargo? Nitroglycerine - as in impact-sensitive, blow-you-to-hell-and-back nitroglycerine.

Almost 57 years have passed, yet The Wages of Fear has aged not a jot. This isn't a nostalgia-tinged review: I've watched the movie only once... and that was yesterday. The synopsis on Flixter mentioned Hitchcock, but unlike the Hollywood master, Clouzot employed no musical score to ratchet tension, an audacious decision to this day. And while Hitchcock primarily influenced the thriller genre, Wages of Fear's inspirations are still witnessed in everything from war movies to action blockbusters. This, friends, is utterly essential viewing.