← Back

The Wages of Fear

Original title: Le salaire de la peur · Turkish title: Dehşet Yolcuları

“‘Dynamic’ ‘Tremendous’ ‘Shattering’”

1953 · 2 h 36 min
Directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot
AdventureDramaThriller

Cast

Yves Montand Charles Vanel Peter van Eyck

Credits

Written by: Georges Arnaud

Plot

In a squalid Latin American town, a group of desperate foreigners, trapped by poverty, accept a job from an American oil company: to drive two trucks loaded with nitroglycerine over rough mountain roads to a distant oil fire. Every bump could be fatal. Henri-Georges Clouzot's 1953 film builds an almost unbearable suspense through its journey, and the characters are tested by fear and greed. It won both the Palme d'Or at Cannes and the Golden Bear in Berlin.

Sinekatalog’s take

Four desperate men drive nitroglycerin trucks across rough mountain roads. Clouzot's long setup pays off in some of cinema's most nerve-shredding suspense.Sinekatalog’s own editorial review – not a user or critic quote.

Ratings

IMDb: 8.1 / 10 (74,609 votes)
IMDb rating and vote count from the IMDb ratings dataset (October 2026). Scores change over time.

If you liked this

Picked by director, genre, era and shared cast. Titles only, no spoilers.