Convoy. (12A)
Directed by Sam Peckinpah.
Starring Kris Kristofferson, Ali McGraw, Ernest Borgnine, Burt Young, Madge Sinclair and Seymour Cassels. 1978. Out on Blu-ray and DVD. 110mins.
The Blu-ray/ DVD release of Sam Peckinpah’s penultimate film is a muted, apologetic affair, even though the disc comes packed with extras. The greatest maker of westerns ever, the man who made the masterpieces The Wild Bunch and Pat Garrett And Billy The Kid had quickly declined into a paranoid, cocaine guzzling, hard drinking, unemployable prima donna. So fast and low had he fallen that he jumped at the chance to make a film based on a popular song about the 70s cult of C.B. radio.
The Making Of documentary is the highlight of the disc. Generally the interviews in these things tend to be upbeat affairs with contributors gushing about how marvellous everyone was, but here the contributors sit around forlornly like they’ve been asked to say a few words at a wake. Ali McGraw almost recoils when recalling the misery of it all. Producer Michael Deeley outlines Peckinpah’s unreasonable behaviour and Kristofferson, while remaining loyal to his old friend, can’t really offer any defence. None of them has a good word about the finished film, other than Deeley who notes that it ultimately did quite well.
The most striking thing about the film is that it’s no fun. Anyone who was around at the time will remember C.W. McCoy’s novelty hit Convoy, possibly with affection. Though it tells of a confrontation between the row of speeding truckers, led by Rubber Duck, and the police, you would expect the film to be a light-hearted affair. In Peckinpah’s hand it becomes a fierce paean to rugged frontiersman individualism. All politics is corrupt and unions are hated; perverse in a film where a put upon group of workers gain some strength and influence by grouping together. The conflict between the truckers, primarily Rubber Duck (Kristofferson) and Borgnine’s corrupt sheriff seems to have no firm basis and is so ferociously disproportionate that it makes the drama seem contrived.
For Peckinpah enthusiasts the most painful moments must surely be those when the film employs his trademark slow motion violence. As Peckinpah had been sacked from the film before the final edit it is impossible to say if these are the self parodic fumblings of a failing talent or a cruel jibe by the producers. The pivotal scene is when Borgnine’s police car goes flying off the road through a sign that says Bring a Friend to Church (trademark Peckinpah anti-clericism) and lands into a chicken coop where the chickens fly off – in slow motion.
It fails as drama but is often very pretty to look at it and, as the other extra features demonstrate, that was all the film needed. The film has prevailed because motor enthusiasts around the world seem to thrill over scenes of big trucks charging across desert landscapes.
Directed by Sam Peckinpah.
Starring Kris Kristofferson, Ali McGraw, Ernest Borgnine, Burt Young, Madge Sinclair and Seymour Cassels. 1978. Out on Blu-ray and DVD. 110mins.
The Blu-ray/ DVD release of Sam Peckinpah’s penultimate film is a muted, apologetic affair, even though the disc comes packed with extras. The greatest maker of westerns ever, the man who made the masterpieces The Wild Bunch and Pat Garrett And Billy The Kid had quickly declined into a paranoid, cocaine guzzling, hard drinking, unemployable prima donna. So fast and low had he fallen that he jumped at the chance to make a film based on a popular song about the 70s cult of C.B. radio.
The Making Of documentary is the highlight of the disc. Generally the interviews in these things tend to be upbeat affairs with contributors gushing about how marvellous everyone was, but here the contributors sit around forlornly like they’ve been asked to say a few words at a wake. Ali McGraw almost recoils when recalling the misery of it all. Producer Michael Deeley outlines Peckinpah’s unreasonable behaviour and Kristofferson, while remaining loyal to his old friend, can’t really offer any defence. None of them has a good word about the finished film, other than Deeley who notes that it ultimately did quite well.
The most striking thing about the film is that it’s no fun. Anyone who was around at the time will remember C.W. McCoy’s novelty hit Convoy, possibly with affection. Though it tells of a confrontation between the row of speeding truckers, led by Rubber Duck, and the police, you would expect the film to be a light-hearted affair. In Peckinpah’s hand it becomes a fierce paean to rugged frontiersman individualism. All politics is corrupt and unions are hated; perverse in a film where a put upon group of workers gain some strength and influence by grouping together. The conflict between the truckers, primarily Rubber Duck (Kristofferson) and Borgnine’s corrupt sheriff seems to have no firm basis and is so ferociously disproportionate that it makes the drama seem contrived.
For Peckinpah enthusiasts the most painful moments must surely be those when the film employs his trademark slow motion violence. As Peckinpah had been sacked from the film before the final edit it is impossible to say if these are the self parodic fumblings of a failing talent or a cruel jibe by the producers. The pivotal scene is when Borgnine’s police car goes flying off the road through a sign that says Bring a Friend to Church (trademark Peckinpah anti-clericism) and lands into a chicken coop where the chickens fly off – in slow motion.
It fails as drama but is often very pretty to look at it and, as the other extra features demonstrate, that was all the film needed. The film has prevailed because motor enthusiasts around the world seem to thrill over scenes of big trucks charging across desert landscapes.
