Sorcerer (1977) Review - William Friedkin’s Relentless, Uncompromising Masterpiece
I finally had a chance to sit down with William Friedkin’s Sorcerer, the 1977 thriller about four men, strangers from different corners of the world, who end up hiding out in a decaying Latin American village. Each of them is running from something. And when a dangerous job transporting unstable loads of nitroglycerin through the jungle promises a chance at escape, they take it. What follows is a film that feels less like a narrative and more like an ordeal, one that I’m still thinking about long after the credits rolled.
A Reimagining of a Classic
Sorcerer is a remake (or more accurately, a re-adaptation) of Henri-Georges Clouzot’s The Wages of Fear from 1953. I went in almost completely blind. I’d avoided the infamous “bridge scene,” avoided listening to Tangerine Dream’s score, and only knew that Roy Scheider starred in it.
That blind viewing paid off because the moment the film ended, I knew I had just watched something rare. Something singular. Something that could only have come out of the 1970s.
Now, to be clear: this isn’t a traditional action film. And I don’t know if every casual viewer in 2025 is going to fall in love with it. But if you appreciate atmospheric, slow-burn tension, the kind where dread seeps into every frame, Sorcerer delivers.
Men With No Heroes Among Them
One thing Friedkin makes clear immediately: none of these characters are heroes. They’re criminals, schemers, and men who have made enough terrible decisions to end up in what Friedkin once described as “a prison without walls.”
They live in crumbling huts. They work for pennies. Disease and corruption define the town. Their only motivation is money. Money that buys a way out. So when the job hauling nitroglycerin comes along, their decision isn’t noble. It’s desperate.
That moral ambiguity does wonders for the story. Without a clean protagonist to anchor yourself to, anything can happen to anyone. The tension is earned, not manufactured. The sense of danger is constant, because there’s no narrative armor to cling to.
And then there’s the pacing. The entire first half of the movie is spent on their backstories and on the oppressive daily life in the village. They don’t even step into the trucks until nearly halfway through the runtime. It’s an unconventional structure by today’s standards, but it works because by the time the engines finally roar, you understand exactly what’s at stake.
A Production as Dangerous as the Plot
If the movie feels dangerous, chaotic, and unpredictable… that’s because it was.
The production of Sorcerer is legendary for its behind-the-scenes misery. Cast and crew cycled out constantly, some fired, others quitting. Many developed gangrene, dysentery, or malaria. The weather fought them at every turn. The infamous bridge sequence? The trucks reportedly toppled into the water seven or eight times with people inside. Even Friedkin’s own truck crashed into the river at one point during filming.
And then, after all that suffering, the film was released right next to Star Wars with almost no marketing support—leading to a spectacular box office failure. Friedkin left the country, quit filmmaking for a year, and only returned to the industry after his life fell apart with his wife even divorcing him.
What would follow was more than a decade of the film being almost impossible to find, not getting a home release until thirteen years later in 1990.
For my viewing, I watched the Criterion 4K Blu-ray, which looks phenomenal. It’s easily the best way to experience this movie today, outside of a theatre doing a 70mm showing which may or may not even be possible.
A Spiritual Sibling to Apocalypse Now
Watching Sorcerer, I couldn’t help but notice how much it echoed the chaotic, fever-dream energy of Apocalypse Now, both in tone and in the stories of their tortured productions. If you’re a fan of on-location filmmaking, where danger feels real and the sweat on screen is the same sweat pouring off the crew, you’ll be right at home.
And if you’re drawn to films with a legacy, movies defined as much by the stories behind them as the stories within them, Sorcerer belongs in your collection.
Quentin Tarantino calls it one of his favorite films ever made. Stephen King has it at the top of his personal list of all time favorites. And for good reason: it’s a towering achievement of 70s cinema.
The Tangerine Dream soundtrack, with its eerie, almost horror-tinged synth swells, is the perfect companion to the film’s mounting paranoia.
Final Verdict
I’m genuinely glad I bought this. Sorcerer is a gripping, nerve-shredding story about how fate can twist a person’s life in ways they could never anticipate. It’s about choices, bad ones, desperate ones, and the brutal roads they force us down.
If you’re a cinephile, a fan of 1970s filmmaking, or someone who loves movies with real behind-the-camera war stories… this is absolutely one to seek out.
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