Convoy (1978) – the best film about truckers

I think everyone has heard of films based on books or based on historical events, or, I don’t know, on folk folklore. Has anyone ever seen movies based on songs? To be honest, I can’t remember a single example, except for the Convoy. Somehow it so happened that in the second half of the 70s in America, everyone suddenly became a fan of civilian radio in general and truckers in particular, and it was at that time, right in the 75th year, that someone C. W. McCall recorded the country track Convoy, which took first place in the many charts, and not only in the USA.

I could not find information about who exactly came up with such an idea, but someone decided to make a whole movie with a plot based on a couple of verses of a popular song at that time.

What is even more surprising: the director of the film suddenly became none other than Sam Peckinpah. Comrade Peckinpah was very famous for his battles with the producers and the rest of the team: it is believed that Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia is the only film over which Sam had full control. All the other filming of his films never went the way Peckinpah intended: the studios intervened, the actors were capricious, some moments had to be reshot – in general, the result never fully corresponded to the director’s vision.

C. W. McCall – Convoy

In addition to the difficult relationship with the team, Peckinpah was also known for his addiction to alcohol, to which cocaine was added at the time of filming the Convoy. But if, according to eyewitnesses, alcohol almost multiplied Peckinpah’s unique look, then cocaine definitely killed him. In addition to all this, another unique feature of Sam was his desire to portray violence and cruelty on the screen openly and fully, due to which Peckinpah received the nickname Bloody Sam. However, at the end of his life, Peckinpah began to regret that he had inserted so much brutality into his films. The problem was that Sam wanted to shock the viewer in this way, not entertain him. In an interview with the 76th year, Peckinpah, in particular, explained that he used to believe in the Greek theory, according to which a person who saw such cruelty should experience fear and pity, through which he would purify and reject, hate such behavior. In the same interview, Sam openly declares that he was wrong and wrong.

The Convoy came out two years after this interview, and this already fully explains the fact that despite the presence of blood on the screen, there is no particularly extreme cruelty in the film. But there are a few more important nuances associated with a very difficult process of making a film. It all started with the fact that Peckinpah didn’t like the script written by a certain Norton at all, and the director did his best to inspire the actors to rewrite the dialogues and improvise. Which, according to the participants, didn’t really work out, or even completely confused the matter, but for the most part apathy reigned on the set. Then Sam Peckinpah decided to move away from the script himself and added a couple of black actors to the cast. Honestly, as a result, they are remembered almost the most, but more on that later.

Peckinpah’s health at the time of filming the Convoy already left much to be desired, and therefore he spent a lot of time not on the set, but in his trailer. As a result, a substantial amount of film was shot not by Sam at all, but by his friend James Coburn, who was the director of the second film crew of the Convoy. But the most important of all the problems happened almost at the end of the creation of the film: Peckinpah assembled and cut a rough version of the film together with Garth Craven, an editor with whom Sam had been working for a long time. That version of the Convoy lasted 220 (!) minutes, and when the studio and producers saw this probe, they… They simply fired Craven along with Peckinpah, after which they created their own version of the film, the main task of which was to parasitize fans of the recently released Smokey And The Bandit (1977).

Needless to say, fans of Sam Peckinpah and his works are far from enthusiastic about the Convoy. Comrade Peckinpah himself was categorically opposed to the fact that the studio decided to finish the production of the film without his participation, and flatly refused to watch the film that turned out as a result. Everyone who happened to see the director’s version claims that it is much better than the producer’s version and much more “peckinpah”, with a lot of branded directing techniques from Bloody Sam. Someone Garner Simmons said that the studio version of the Convoy “cut out all the insides from the film.” On the other hand, there are a considerable number of people who claimed – and still continue to claim – that the Convoy is the best trucker movie that has ever existed in this world. In addition, it is impossible not to mention the fact that of all Peckinpah’s filmography, Convoy is the most commercially successful film, and its subject matter is such that it was even rolled in USSR cinemas with official dubbing.

And I think I’ll put myself in the group that liked the movie. I’ll make a couple of reservations at once: Convoy is the first film by Sam Peckinpah that I watched, and at the same time, at the time of viewing, I had not seen a single film from the filmography of this director. But at the same time I watched the movie Smokey And the Bandit, which I really liked. It is also worth noting that I watched the Convoy with the same Soviet dubbing (but with inserts from voisover for some moments, since the film was released in Soviet rental, it seems, still cut, if my memory serves me right). This is a very important nuance, since in the reviews of this film in English it is sometimes noted that the actors voiced their roles… well, not that bad, but as if not understanding what exactly they want to play. In light of the dismissal of their director and, perhaps, absolutely different requirements of the studio, this is understandable, but in dubbing this problem is completely absent, and I was satisfied with the voice acting. Yes, the installation sometimes jumps strangely, but, on the whole, digestible, and, still not being very familiar with Peckinpah’s style, I can’t say how much the Convoy differs from his other works.

Considering all of the above, I got a very good film on an extremely unpopular subject. Yes, this is definitely the best movie about truckers – because there are very few such movies in principle. So, on the move, I can only remember three such films, and the Convoy will undoubtedly be the best of them. It has a fairly simple, not particularly stressful plot – almost a road movie with a couple of action scenes, although in the end everything changes somewhat. But despite the simplicity, the Convoy still unobtrusively talks about certain problems of society, and it is quite understandable why the film deserved a place in the cinemas of the Soviet Union.The actors as a whole may not play very well, but the central roles of the protagonist and the antagonist are unambiguously staged and executed perfectly. The main character named Rubber Duckling, by the way, is played by none other than Kris Kristofferson – an extremely multifaceted personality. Moviegoers will most likely recognize him for the role of Abraham Whistler, the mentor of the vampire slayer Blade from the trilogy of the same name. Video game fans could hear Chris’ voice in Fallout: New Vegas. Well, country music lovers are probably familiar with Kristofferson’s music albums. Working with Sam Peckinpah not for the first time, Chris was one of those who accepted the director’s desire to make changes to the script, and therefore decided to make a kind of messiah out of a Rubber Duckling for other truckers. But, as Peckinpah himself admitted, he did not immediately understand Chris’s intentions. And coupled with all the events mentioned, there are not so many allusions to Jesus and his followers in the final version of the film. And do you remember I mentioned black actors? They are American stand-up comedian Franklin Ajaye and Jamaican actress Madge Sinclair. Of all the minor characters, they both turned out to be the most colorful and memorable – especially Madge in the role of the Black Widow trucker.

Action scenes are rare and, allegedly, most of them were shot solely by coincidence. For example – now there will be a small spoiler – that scene when the Black Widow flips her truck and serves as a catalyst for countless jokes over 300 about women driving was a real accident, and it was written into the script mainly because the truck was damaged too badly to repair it. And, well, despite the fact that it was an accident, the scene looks extremely impressive – and the same can be said about all the action scenes of the film. I may be wrong, of course, but does it really matter if it was by accident or planned, if it turned out in the best way? They say that many great discoveries were made by chance, and how many excellent shots in a variety of films appeared due to chance – certainly can not be counted. Why am I doing this? Yes, to the fact that some are trying to give out the fact that the action scenes were not planned in advance, as a minus of the film. Personally, I don’t see any disadvantages in this. And anyway, isn’t that what Sam Peckinpah wanted – improvisation and script changes?

In addition, the Convoy perfectly conveys the atmosphere of that time. You can even personally admire such a culture as Jesus Freaks – a kind of hippie with a touch of religion. But in fact, in a movie about truckers, the most important aspect is trucks – and that’s where everything is in order. A whole scattering of heavyweights – vintage, new, with and without a nose, GMC, Kenworth, Diamond, Peterbilt, Brockway… There are a lot of them, a lot, some flash on the screen for a couple of seconds, and some stay with us from the very first frames. And, of course, their leader is the black Mack of the R series with an iconic figure on the hood – all of them are far from the last reason that I really love the Convoy and strongly advise everyone to watch it.

And, of course, it is impossible not to write a couple of lines about the song on which the film was shot. It exists… There are enough versions of the track to get confused in them, as well as a solid number of covers and a sequel called ‘Round The World With The Rubber Duck, in which the Convoy travels through Britain, France, the USSR, Japan, Australia… No, this song was not filmed. One way or another, unfortunately none of the versions of Convoy contains all the verses that were used in the film, which is very sad. Personally, as a result, I cut something of my own for my own use, which consists of that version of the song, the words of which are more similar to the plot of the film, in which I replaced one verse by cutting out another from the film, which I liked better, simultaneously adding wisdom from the Mississippi Flash:

“The only things in life that count are fast trucks, fast women and fast food.”

Of course, it would be very interesting to see the original cut of the Convoy at 3:40, but it seems to have been lost forever. But the film that we got, in my opinion, is also quite good. In general, it’s a good and strong movie, even if as a result it was made in order to raise money from Smokey And Bandit lovers. It has an idea and the right message – and let it come from the wrong desire. In the end, it doesn’t matter who you buy a thing from and what goals the seller pursues there – what matters is what you do with this thing and what goals you will have.