A gangster, a crooked banker, a hit man and an Arab terrorist are stranded and on the run in a small village in South America. Their only chance of escape is to drive two trucks filled with unstable dynamite (leaking nitroglycerin) up a long and rocky mountain road in order to plug an escalating oil refinery blaze. With their deadly cargo likely to explode at the slightest bump, the four men must put aside their differences and work together to survive.
Friedkin’s remake of The Wages of Fear opened against Star Wars and disappeared. The film, restored in 2014, is now widely regarded as one of the greatest American thrillers. Friedkin called it the film he was proudest of.
