STEPHEN'S MOVIE GUIDE

For Friedkin though, Sorceror was seen as a logical step forward from The Exorcist – after a movie which was about faith, this was to be the opposite, a movie about fate. Seen as impossible to make by the studios, that only made him want to make the movie more, especially with his contemporary Francis Ford Coppola planning his own ‘impossible to make’ movie set in a jungle, ‘Apocalypse Now’. With locations in Dominican Republic and Mexico primarily for the jungle scenes, and also Paris, New Jersey and Jerusalem for the backstory vignettes, the budget was a not-insignificant $15 million, and this only spiraled to $22 million when difficulties started to mount. This was significant enough that two studios had to share the cost and risk to get the movie released (Paramount and Universal). It was estimated it would have to gross around $45 to 50 million to break even .. in the end it made just $9 million, worldwide. Friedkin (and others) attributed this to two things – coming out just two weeks after Star Wars, and the unfortunate choice for the name of the movie. The movie had nothing to do with evil magic as the name might conjure up in your mind (despite its hallucinogenic final moments..) but had two meanings – the literal one being that it is the name of one of the trucks, and the figurative one being that fate itself is a sorcerer. In this story, men can run away and try to hide from fate but “..life is filled with betrayal, and fate is waiting around the corner to kick you in the ass.” As Friedkin said. However, given this was the movie from the director of The Exorcist, it was unsurprising that audiences assumed a name like Sorceror meant something more literally supernatural.

The making of the movie is a saga in itself, worthy of its own movie. The cast were led by Roy Scheider, with whom Friedkin had already worked, in The French Connection, but otherwise was made up of an eclectic mixture of international actors, who were not well known in Hollywood. Scheider wasn’t the first choice however, that was Steve McQueen. McQueen loved the script, but was unwilling to leave his wife Ali MacGraw behind for filming, and insisted a role be found for her. Friedkin balked, and so lost his first choice for the role. Clint Eastwood, Jack Nicholson, and Warren Oates also were considered before Scheider.

After filming the first opening vignette, the crew moved to Jerusalem. While filming their mock movie explosion (which was big enough to blow out the mayors window, and injure the stuntman setting it off), another actual bomb went off – allowing some second unit filming to capture some additional footage lending an air of authenticity and chaos to the scene. After filming the next scene in New Jersey, work began on building the bridge for the key suspense set piece in the movie. Although requiring $1 million to complete, the crew then faced a shortage of rainfall – the river became completely dry. Locations in Mexico were scouted and an alternative location found on the Papaloapan River – the bridge was rebuilt again at a cost of an additional $1 million. Workers were found, but additional security was needed due to threats of sabotage from the villagers who were reluctant to have a movie called ‘Sorceror’ by the director of ‘The Exorcist’ film in their locale. Unfortunately, one of the workers was an undercover narcotics agent, who let Friedkin know that several key members of the film crew were in the possession of drugs – the crew were rushed to the airport and had to be replaced at short notice. The filming curse continued, and the local area faced an unexpected drought – in the end, massive pumps and sprinklers had to complete the scene to make it work. Several trucks tipped over into the river during filming, adding to the significant cost of just that scene alone. No rear projection or visual effects were used – to keep the scene as real as possible. This meant Roy Scheider had to actually learn how to maneuver the massive truck – an experience he described as ‘rehearsing to stay alive’, leading him to quip that working on this movie made shooting ‘Jaws’ look like a picnic.

Most of the movie was shot in Dominican Republic, for the jungle scenes, although some scenes (including the bridge and one of the opening vignettes) used Mexico, and the surreal final scenes where Roy Scheider’s character struggles to retain his sanity, used Bisti / De-Na-Zin Wilderness in New Mexico. Those jungle scenes took their toll.. the movie shoot was beset by injury or illness – around 50 people reportedly left with either injury or gangrene. Friedkin himself caught malaria, and lost 23kg (Fifty pounds).