William Friedkin’s 10 Most Jaw-Dropping Movie Moments
7. Sorcerer (1977)
Sorcerer derived its title from a Miles Davis album Friedkin was listening to during the production. It was also the name given to one of the two trucks which attempt to transport their deadly cargo of nitro-glycerine through the jungle on a suicide mission, in order to put out a fire raging at an isolated oil refinery. One of the most nail-biting moments in the film occurs when both trucks are forced to cross an extremely precarious wooden suspension bridge over a fast-flowing river, during a raging tropical storm. The resulting scene took several months to shoot, at a total cost of three million dollars (a huge amount in the mid-seventies) and has been described by Friedkin as the most arduous thing he has ever filmed. Star Roy Scheider would later say that: Shooting Sorcerer made Jaws look like a picnic but the result is truly jaw-dropping and a work of considerable virtuosity when you consider that there are no special effects whatsoever on display here. Its really happening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlDgySQGxO4
Since studying Film and Art History at University, I’ve been an actor, movie stand-in and journalist. I have contributed to a number of media websites, worked on national daily newspapers, written fiction of all kinds and worked as a gravedigger.
