Yves Montand has a tough go of it in THE WAGES OF FEAR
LE SALAIRE DE LA PEUR (THE WAGES OF FEAR) (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1953)
CinémaTuesdays:
French Institute Alliance Française
Florence Gould Hall
55 East 59th St. between Madison & Park Aves.
Tuesday, October 19, $10, separate admission for each screening
212-355-6160
www.fiaf.org
In a very poor South American village, four men are needed to transport two truckloads of nitroglycerin to the scene of an industrial accident. The men jump at the chance to risk their lives for a small amount of cash because they have nothing else in their pitiful lives. Yves Montand stars in this endlessly tense, harrowing film that won the Golden Bear in Berlin, the BAFTA in England, and the Grand Prize at Cannes. The cast also includes Charles Vanet, Peter van Eyck, Folco Lulli, and Véra Clouzot, the wife of director Henri-Georges Clouzot (LES DIABOLIQUES, LES ESPIONS). THE WAGES OF FEAR will be screening as part of the French Institute Alliance Française series Hollywood Loves French Cinema, along with William Friedkin’s surprisingly gripping 1977 remake, SORCERER, in which Roy Scheider does an outstanding job playing the torturous Montand role as a driver who must go through hell to try to get a shipment of nitroglycerine to its intended destination.