title: MC Ride

text: On July 2, 2014, Death Grips announced their disbandment, stating that "Death Grips is over". This was followed up with the band's Twitter page posting a photo of the announcement of the break-up written on a napkin. The group re-emerged in January 2015 with the release of an instrumental soundtrack, "Fashion Week". This was followed up with the release of "Jenny Death", the second disc of "The Powers That B", in March. Another instrumental project, "Interview 2016", was released in March 2016. They released their fifth studio album, "Bottomless Pit", in May 2016; it was their first full-length release that included vocals from Ride since their alleged disbandment.


title: MC Ride

text: Death Grips' next release, the EP "Steroids (Crouching Tiger Hidden Gabber Megamix)", a single 22-minute mix of eight separate songs, was released in May 2017. The band's sixth studio album, "Year of the Snitch", was released in June 2018. In June 2019, Death Grips released a previously unreleased megamix entitled "Gmail and the Restraining Orders" for Warp Records' 30th anniversary.


title: MC Ride

text: Ride's vocal delivery has been described as "(a) visceral and poetic form of rapping, resembling a blend of hardcore punk and spoken word performance". His style was also described as "paint-peeling barks and startling yelps". On his review for Death Grips' "Exmilitary", Nate Patrin commented on Ride's vocals: "Monolithic and harsh, his voice sounds powerful doubling up the beats to the point where it doesn't even seem like a problem when it's halfway buried in the mix." Evan Rytelewski of "The A.V. Club" described Ride's voice as "another instrument of abrasion as he hollers in a voice so tattered and blown-out it must physically pain him".


title: MC Ride

text: Ride's lyrics are described as "chants and rants, rhythmic elements that are barely intelligible - though full of bleak, deranged, or drugged-out thoughts". Ride's lyrics engage with various topics, including sex, drugs, addiction, economic collapse, insanity, suicide, occultism, paranoia, and techno-futurism. John Calvert of "The Quietus" wrote, "Death Grips embroils MC Ride's consciousness in a schematised Braque-esque maze, a gloaming constellation, a synaptic thing." Chase Woodruff of "Slant Magazine" argued that Ride's lyrics "hint at a contemporary, vaguely political edge to all his rage and alienation". James Ubaghs of "The Quietus" wrote that Ride's "paranoid, politically-charged ravings might not present any sort of solution to the world's myriad ills, but he is at the least paying close attention to how fucked things really are, and that's more than you can say for a lot of his contemporaries".


title: MC Ride

text: In a "Pitchfork" interview, Ride stated that although he has favorite musicians such as Jimi Hendrix, he takes more inspiration from his internal struggles than human achievements. He has a side career as a visual artist. His art consists of dark, monochromatic portraits. His first exhibition took place at Slow Culture in Los Angeles' Chinatown from January 7 to January 28, 2017.


title: MC Ride

text: Contrary to his aggressive rap style, Burnett is soft spoken; in a 2012 interview with "Spin", he said, "I'm a very private person, I have very few people that I call my friends. I'm very distrustful of human beings in general; I'm very distrustful of media. I have no interest in sharing my personal life with the world. Zero." He has been described as "reclusive" and "super private" by his bandmate Zach Hill.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal II ( "el-Melik Faysal es-Sânî") (2 May 1935 – 14 July 1958) was the last King of Iraq. He reigned from 4 April 1939 until July 1958, when he was killed during the 14 July Revolution. This regicide marked the end of the thirty-seven-year-old Hashemite monarchy in Iraq, which then became a republic.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: The only son of King Ghazi of Iraq and Queen Aliya, Faisal acceded to the throne at the age of three after his father was killed in a car crash. A regency was set up under his uncle Prince 'Abd al-Ilah. In 1941, a pro-Axis coup d'état overthrew the regent. The British responded by initiating an invasion of Iraq a month later and restored 'Abd al-Ilah to power. During the Second World War, Faisal was evacuated along with his mother to the United Kingdom, where he attended Harrow School. The regency ended in May 1953 when Faisal came of age.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal's reign grew increasingly unstable against a backdrop of economic inequality coupled with the rise of Communism, anti-imperialist sentiment and mounting Pan-Arab nationalism. The overthrow of the Egyptian monarchy in 1953 and the formation of the United Arab Republic in February 1958 only provided further impetuses to revolution. The Hashemite Arab Federation was formed between Iraq and Jordan in February 1958 with Faisal as its head, which did not quell widespread opposition. In July 1958, a group of Royal Iraqi Army officers led by Abd al-Karim Qasim mounted a coup d'état and overthrew the monarchy. Faisal was executed along with numerous members of his family in the process.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal was the only son of King Ghazi of Iraq and his wife, Queen Aliya, second daughter of 'Ali bin Hussein, King of the Hijaz and Grand Sharif of Mecca. Faisal's father was killed in a mysterious car crash when he was three years old; his uncle, Prince 'Abd al-Ilah, served as regent until Faisal came of age in 1953.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: King Faisal II was the model used by Belgian comic writer Hergé for his character Prince Abdullah of Khemed in "The Adventures of Tintin". He suffered from asthma.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal's childhood coincided with the Second World War, in which the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq was formally allied with the British Empire and the Allies. In April 1941, his uncle 'Abd al-Ilah was briefly deposed as Regent by a military "coup d'état" which aimed to align Iraq with the Axis powers. The 1941 coup in Iraq soon led to the Anglo-Iraqi War. German aid proved insufficient, and the puppet 'Abd al-Ilah was restored to power by a combined Allied force composed of the mercenary Jordanian Arab Legion, the Royal Air Force and other British units. Iraq resumed its British overlordship, and at the end of the war joined the United Nations.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: During his early years, Faisal was tutored at the royal palace with several other Iraqi boys. During the Second World War, he lived for a time with his mother at Grove Lodge at Winkfield Row in Berkshire in England. As a teenager, Faisal attended Harrow School with his second cousin The Prince Hussein, later to become King Hussein of Jordan. The two boys were close friends, and reportedly planned early on to merge their two realms, to counter what they considered to be the "threat" of Communism and left-leaning variants of pan-Arab nationalism.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: In 1952, Faisal visited the United States, where he met President Harry Truman, Dean Acheson, the actor James Mason, and Jackie Robinson, among others.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Hastening Faisal's demise was the decision taken by his regent (later confirmed by him) to allow the United Kingdom to retain a continued role in Iraqi affairs, through the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty of 1948, and later the Baghdad Pact, signed in 1955. Increasing massive protests greeted news of each of these alliances, contributing to the deaths of hundreds of demonstrators and an increasing deterioration of loyalty to the Iraqi Crown.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal attained his majority on 2 May 1953, commencing his active rule with little experience and during a changing Iraqi political and social climate exacerbated by the rapid development of pan-Arab nationalism.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal initially relied for political advice upon his uncle Prince 'Abd al-Ilah and General Nuri al-Sa'id, a veteran politician and nationalist who had already served several terms as Prime Minister. As oil revenues increased during the 1950s, the king and his advisers chose to invest their wealth in development projects, which some claimed increasingly alienated the rapidly growing middle class and the peasantry. The Iraqi Communist Party increased its influence. Though the regime seemed secure, intense dissatisfaction with Iraq's condition brewed just below the surface. An ever-widening gap between the wealth of the political elites, landowners and other supporters of the regime on the one hand, and the poverty of workers and peasants on the other, intensified opposition to Faisal's government. Since the upper classes controlled the parliament, reformists increasingly saw revolution as their sole hope for improvement. The Egyptian Revolution of 1952, led by Gamal Abdel Nasser, provided an impetus for a similar undertaking in Iraq.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: On 1 February 1958, neighbouring Syria joined with Nasser's Egypt to form the United Arab Republic. This apparently prompted the Hashemite kingdoms of Iraq and Jordan to strengthen their ties by establishing a similar alliance. Two weeks later, on 14 February, this league formally became the Arab Federation of Iraq and Jordan. Faisal, as the senior member of the Hashemite family, became its head of state.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal's political situation deteriorated in 1956, with uprisings in the cities of Najaf and Hayy. Meanwhile, Israel's attack on Egypt, coordinated with Britain and France in response to Nasser's nationalisation of the Suez Canal, only exacerbated popular revulsion for the Baghdad Pact, and thus Faisal's regime. The opposition began to coordinate its activities; in February 1957, a "Front of National Union" was established, bringing together the National Democrats, Independents, Communists, and the Ba'ath Party. An identical process ensued within the Iraqi officer corps with the formation of a "Supreme Committee of Free Officers". Faisal's government endeavoured to preserve the military's loyalty through generous benefits, but this proved increasingly ineffective as more and more officers came to sympathise with the nascent pro-republican anti-monarchist movement.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: In the summer of 1958, King Hussein of Jordan asked for Iraqi military assistance during the escalating Lebanon crisis. Units of the Royal Iraqi Army under the command of Colonel Abd al-Karim Qasim, "en route" to Jordan, chose to march on Baghdad instead, where they mounted a "coup d'état" on 14 July. During the 14 July Revolution, Faisal II ordered the Royal Guard to offer no resistance, and surrendered to the insurgents. Around 8 am, Captain Abdul Sattar Sabaa Al-Ibousi, leading the revolutionary assault group at the Rihab Palace, which was still the principal royal residence in central Baghdad, ordered the King, Crown Prince 'Abd al-Ilah, Crown Princess Hiyam ('Abd al-Ilah's wife), Princess Nafeesa ('Abd al-Ilah's mother), Princess Abadiya (Faisal's aunt) and several servants to gather in the palace courtyard (the young King having not yet moved into the newly completed Royal Palace). There they were told to turn toward the wall and were immediately executed by their captors.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Many years later, when the Iraqi historian Safa Khulusi met Al-Ibousi, who was once one of Khulusi's students, and questioned him on his part in Faisal's death, the former student answered, "all I did was remember Palestine, and the trigger on the machine-gun just set itself off".


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: During the regime of Saddam Hussein, Faisal II was reburied under a marble tomb located next to that of his father in the restored Royal Mausoleum in Baghdad.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Faisal II was the author of "Ways to Defend Yourself" (1951), an Arabic book on judo and self-defense, and he printed 50 copies of it and gave it to other kings and leaders on top of them his uncle King Abdullah of Jordan. He also gave a copy of it to the League of Arab Nations hoping to reprint it and distribute it for free on the youth in Arab countries, but that never happened.


title: Faisal II of Iraq

text: Martyr Faisal II College ("Kolleyet Al-Shahid Faisal Al-Thani") is a military school in Jordan that was named after him.


title: Alexa Nikolas

text: Alexa Nikolas (born April 4, 1992) is an American actress. She is known for her role as Nicole Bristow on the Nickelodeon television series "Zoey 101". Nikolas has also appeared on various other television series, including "That's Life", "Hidden Hills", "Revelations", and "The Walking Dead".


title: Alexa Nikolas

text: In 2004, at age 12, Nikolas was cast as Nicole Bristow on "Zoey 101", alongside Jamie Lynn Spears. In 2006, following the conclusion of the second season, Nikolas exited the series, following numerous fights and incidents with Spears, and her character Nicole was written out of the series. In August 2005, it was reported that Britney Spears confronted Nikolas about the feud. She later alleged Nickelodeon failed to protect her from abuse, saying she "did not feel safe" around the show's creator, Dan Schneider.


title: Alexa Nikolas

text: In addition, Nikolas appeared on "Hidden Hills" regularly and also on the 2005 series "Revelations". Following her departure from "Zoey 101", Nikolas guest starred on various other television series, most notably "The Suite Life of Zack & Cody", "Judging Amy", "ER", "Without a Trace", "Criminal Minds", and "Heroes" with actress Laura Marano who played young Alice Shaw the sister of Nikolas's character, Angela.


title: Alexa Nikolas

text: In 2011, she appeared in the film "Red State" as Jesse, and that same year she appeared on "Family Guy" as additional voices. Nikolas appeared in three episodes of the television series "The Walking Dead" – her character, Haley, was introduced in November 2012, before being killed off in February 2013. In 2012 Nikolas starred as Willow in the comedy-horror film "Detention of the Dead".


title: Alexa Nikolas

text: Nikolas married Canadian electronic musician Mike Milosh in 2012. In 2016, Nikolas and Milosh split up.


title: Alexa Nikolas

text: In May 2020, Nikolas announced via her Instagram that she was pregnant with her first child with her boyfriend Michael Gray. She confirmed the birth of her child in November 2020. In July 2021, Nikolas announced on Instagram that she married Gray on July 26, 2021 at Crystal Lake in Angeles National Forest in Southern California.


title: Alexa Nikolas

text: In 2022, Nikolas founded the Eat Predators movement, which seeks to call out alleged predators and networks. The movement has set up protests at several locations in the Los Angeles metropolitan area.


title: Hydralazine

text: Hydralazine, sold under the brand name Apresoline among others, is a medication used to treat high blood pressure and heart failure. This includes high blood pressure in pregnancy and very high blood pressure resulting in symptoms. It has been found to be particularly useful in heart failure, together with isosorbide dinitrate, for treatment of people of African descent. It is given by mouth or by injection into a vein. Effects usually begin around 15 minutes and last up to six hours.


title: Hydralazine

text: Common side effects include headache and fast heart rate. It is not recommended in people with coronary artery disease or in those with rheumatic heart disease that affects the mitral valve. In those with kidney disease a low dose is recommended. Hydralazine is in the vasodilator family of medications, so it is believed to work by causing the dilation of blood vessels.


title: Hydralazine

text: Hydralazine was discovered while scientists at Ciba were looking for a treatment for malaria. It was patented in 1949. It is on the World Health Organization's List of Essential Medicines. In 2020, it was the 103rd most commonly prescribed medication in the United States, with more than 6million prescriptions.


title: Hydralazine

text: Hydralazine is not used as a primary drug for treating hypertension because it elicits a reflex sympathetic stimulation of the heart (the baroreceptor reflex). The sympathetic stimulation may increase heart rate and cardiac output, and in people with coronary artery disease may cause angina pectoris or myocardial infarction. Hydralazine may also increase plasma renin concentration, resulting in fluid retention. To prevent these undesirable side effects, hydralazine is usually prescribed in combination with a beta blocker (e.g., propranolol) and a diuretic. Beta-blockers licensed to treat heart failure in the UK include bisoprolol, carvedilol, and nebivolol.


title: Hydralazine

text: Hydralazine is used to treat severe hypertension, but is not a first-line therapy for essential hypertension. Hydralazine is often used to treat hypertension in pregnancy, though, with either labetalol and/or methyldopa.


title: Hydralazine

text: Hydralazine is commonly used in combination with isosorbide dinitrate for the treatment of congestive heart failure in black populations. This preparation, isosorbide dinitrate/hydralazine, was the first race-based prescription drug.


title: Hydralazine

text: It should not be used in people who have tachycardia, heart failure, constrictive pericarditis, lupus, a dissecting aortic aneurysm, or porphyria.


title: Hydralazine

text: Prolonged treatment may cause a syndrome similar to lupus, which can become fatal if the symptoms are not noticed and drug treatment stopped. Hydralazine is within the top three drugs that is known to induce systemic lupus and this adverse drug event is dose dependent yet significant.


title: Hydralazine

text: Common (1–10% frequency) side effects include flushing, hypotension, anginal symptoms, aching or swelling joints, muscle aches, positive tests for atrial natriuretic peptide, stomach upset, diarrhea, nausea and vomiting, and swelling (sodium and water retention).


title: Hydralazine

text: Drugs subject to a strong first-pass effect such as beta blockers may increase the bioavailability of hydralazine. Epinephrine (adrenaline), by its heart rate-accelerating effects as increased by hydralazine, may lead to toxicity.


title: Hydralazine

text: Hydralazine is a drug that conducts the blood pressure lowering effects by vasoconstrictive repression. It is a direct-acting smooth muscle relaxant and acts as a vasodilator primarily in resistance arterioles, also known as the smooth muscle of the arterial bed. The molecular mechanism involves inhibition of inositol trisphosphate-induced Ca release from the sarcoplasmic reticulum in arterial smooth muscle cells. By relaxing vascular smooth muscle, vasodilators act to decrease peripheral resistance, thereby lowering blood pressure and decreasing afterload.


title: Hydralazine

text: The antihypertensive activity of hydralazine was discovered by scientists at Ciba, who were trying to discover drugs to treat malaria; it was initially called C-5968 and 1-hydrazinophthalazine; Ciba's patent application was filed in 1945 and issued in 1949, and the first scientific publications of its blood pressure-lowering activities appeared in 1950. It was approved by the FDA in 1953.


title: Hydralazine

text: Hydralazine has also been studied as a treatment for myelodysplastic syndrome in its capacity as a DNA methyltransferase inhibitor.


title: ParaNorman

text: ParaNorman is a 2012 American stop-motion animated comedy horror film directed by Sam Fell and Chris Butler (the latter's feature directorial debut), and written by Butler. Produced by Laika, the film stars the voices of Kodi Smit-McPhee, Jodelle Ferland, Bernard Hill, Tucker Albrizzi, Anna Kendrick, Casey Affleck, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Leslie Mann, Jeff Garlin, Elaine Stritch, Tempestt Bledsoe, Alex Borstein, and John Goodman. It is the first stop-motion film to use a 3D color printer to create character faces, and only the second to be shot in 3D. In the film, Norman Babcock, a young boy who can communicate with ghosts, is given the task of ending a 300-year-old witch's curse on his Massachusetts town.


title: ParaNorman

text: The idea of "ParaNorman" came from Buter, who thought making such a movie for kids could help express the challenges kids face growing up, after realizing that zombie films often contained a degree of social commentary. Production of the stop-motion animation feature took place at Laika's studio in Hillsboro, Oregon for three years, with the animating stage of production lasting about two years and beginning in late 2009. Instead of using traditional 3D format cameras, the studio had sixty Canon EOS 5D Mark II DSLR cameras film the movie. Jon Brion composed the film's musical score.


title: ParaNorman

text: "ParaNorman" was officially released on August 17, 2012, by Focus Features. It received generally positive reviews from critics, who praised its animation and humor, and was a modest box office success, earning $107 million worldwide against its budget of $60 million. The film was nominated for that year's Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film, but lost both to Pixar's "Brave".


title: ParaNorman

text: In the small fictional town of Blithe Hollow, Massachusetts, Norman Babcock is an 11-year-old boy who speaks with the dead, including his late grandmother and various ghosts in town. Almost no one believes him and he is isolated emotionally from his family while being looked down upon by his own peers around the school. Neil Downe, an overweight boy who is also bullied, finds in Norman a kindred spirit. After rehearsing a school play commemorating the town's execution of a witch three centuries ago, the boys are confronted by Norman's estranged and seemingly deranged great-uncle, Mr. Prenderghast, who tells Norman that he soon must take up his regular ritual to protect the town. Soon after this encounter, Mr. Prenderghast dies of a heart attack.


title: ParaNorman

text: During the official performance of the school play, Norman has a nightmarish vision of the town's past in which he is pursued through the woods by townsfolk on a witch hunt, embarrassing himself and leading to a heated argument with his estranged and paranoid father Perry, who later grounds him. His mother Sandra tells him that his father's manner is stern because he is afraid for him. The next day, Norman sees Prenderghast's spirit who tells him that the ritual must be performed with a certain book before sundown that day; then making him "swear" to complete the task, Prenderghast's spirit is set free and crosses over. Norman is at first reluctant to go because he is scared but his grandmother tells him it is all right to be scared as long as he does not let it change who he is. Norman sets off to retrieve the book from Prenderghast's house (having to take it from his corpse).


title: ParaNorman

text: He then goes to the graves of the five men and two women who were cursed by the witch, but finds that the book is merely a series of fairy tales. Alvin, a school bully who always picks on Norman, arrives and prevents Norman from reading the story before sundown. Norman attempts to continue reading from the book, to no effect. A ghostly storm resembling the witch appears in the air, summoning the cursed dead to arise as zombies, who chase the boys along with Neil, Norman's 17-year-old sister Courtney, and Neil's older brother Mitch, down the hill and into town. Having realized that the witch was not buried in the graveyard, Norman contacts classmate Salma (who tells them to access the Town Hall's archives for the location of the witch's unmarked grave) for help. As the kids make their way to the Town Hall, the zombies are attacked by the citizenry. During the riot, Norman and his companions break into the archives but cannot find the information they need. As the mob moves to attack Town Hall, the witch storm appears over the crowd. Norman climbs the Hall's tower to read the book, in a last-ditch effort to finish the ritual, but the witch strikes the book with lightning, hurling Norman from the tower and deep into the archives.


title: ParaNorman

text: Unconscious, Norman has a dream where he learns that the witch was Agatha "Aggie" Prenderghast, a little girl of his age and a distant relative, who was also a medium. Norman realizes that Aggie was wrongfully convicted by the town council when they mistook her powers for witchcraft. After awakening, Norman encounters the zombies and recognizes them as the town council who convicted Aggie. The zombies and their leader Judge Hopkins admit that they only wanted to speak with him to ensure that he would take up the ritual, to minimize the damage of the mistake they made so long ago. Norman attempts to help the zombies slip away so they can guide him to Aggie's grave, but is cornered by the mob. Courtney, Mitch, Neil, and Alvin rally to Norman's side and confront the crowd, arguing that their rage, fear, and misunderstanding make them no different from the cursed townsfolk from long ago. Although the mob realizes the error of their ways, the witch unleashes her powers to create greater havoc throughout the town.


title: ParaNorman

text: Judge Hopkins guides Norman's family to the grave in a forest. Before the grave is reached, Aggie's magical powers separate Norman from the others. Norman finds the grave and interacts with Aggie's vengeful spirit, determined to stop the cataclysmic tantrum she has been having over the years. Though she attempts to push him away, Norman holds his ground, telling her that he understands how she feels as an outcast, that her vengeance has only made her like the ones who wronged her, causing her to remember happier days. Having finally encountered someone who understands her plight and by remembering her caring mother, Aggie is able to find a measure of peace and cross over to the afterlife. The storm dissipates, and she, the zombies and even the Judge all fade away. The town cleans up and regards Norman as a hero.


title: ParaNorman

text: In the end, Norman watches a horror film with his family and the ghost of his grandmother, who have grown to accept Norman for who he is.


title: ParaNorman

text: Blithe Hollow townspeople are voiced by Kirk Baily, Cam Clarke, Lara Cody, Eddie Frierson, Rif Hutton, Edie Mirman and David Zyler.


title: ParaNorman

text: The idea of the film came from Chris Butler, who, realizing that zombie films often contained a degree of social commentary, thought making such a movie for kids could help express the challenges kids face growing up.


title: ParaNorman

text: Production of the stop-motion animation feature took place at Laika's studio in Hillsboro, Oregon. The film was in production for three years, with the animating stage of production lasting about two years and beginning in late 2009. Rather than using traditional 3D format cameras, the studio had sixty Canon EOS 5D Mark II DSLR cameras film the movie. Advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy created the campaign for the film. "ParaNorman" is the first ever stop motion film to use full-color 3D printers for replacement animation. Laika's previous film "Coraline" had pioneered and popularized the use of black and white 3D printers, which sped up puppet production considerably and allowed the team to make the large number of puppet faces required for the film. "Quite often it’s the stop-motion movies that are more out there," co-director Fell told "The New York Times". "They're a little quirkier, they're a little harder to pin down."


title: ParaNorman

text: Jon Brion composed the film's score, and an accompanying soundtrack album was released on August 14, 2012. Bits of other music appear in the film, including the theme music from "Halloween", the Donovan song "Season of the Witch" (sung by the school play cast) and "Fix Up, Look Sharp" by British rapper Dizzee Rascal. "Little Ghost", a White Stripes song from their 2005 album "Get Behind Me Satan", plays at the end, over character cards identifying the main cast. However, one track in the film, an updated version of "Aggie Fights", was not included in the soundtrack.


title: ParaNorman

text: "ParaNorman" was released on DVD and Blu-ray on November 27, 2012 by Universal Pictures Home Entertainment. A new edition from Shout! Factory under license from Universal was released on September 14, 2021.


title: ParaNorman

text: Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes gives "ParaNorman" an approval rating of 89% based on 185 reviews, and an average score of 7.30/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Beautifully animated and solidly scripted, "ParaNorman" will entertain (and frighten) older children while providing surprisingly thoughtful fare for their parents." Metacritic gives the film a weighted average score of 72 out of 100 based on 33 reviews, which indicates "generally favorable reviews." Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.


title: ParaNorman

text: Justin Chang of "Variety" wrote in his review, "Few movies so taken with death have felt so rudely alive as "ParaNorman", the latest handcrafted marvel from the stop-motion artists at Laika." Michael Rechtshaffen of "The Hollywood Reporter" said, "It has its entertaining moments, but this paranormal stop-motion animated comedy-chiller cries out for more activity."


title: ParaNorman

text: "ParaNorman" earned $56 million in North America, and $51.1 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $107.1 million. The film premiered in Mexico on August 3, 2012, opening in second place with box office receipts of $2.2 million, behind "The Dark Knight Rises". For its opening weekend in North America, the film placed third, with receipts of $14 million, behind "The Expendables 2" and "The Bourne Legacy". Travis Knight, head of the studio that produced the film, believed the box office total was fine, but did not live up to his expectations.


title: ParaNorman

text: The film has drawn attention for the revelation in its final scenes that supporting character Mitch is gay, making him the first openly gay character in a mainstream animated film. Nancy French of "National Review Online" suggested that the film could lead parents "to answer unwanted questions about sex and homosexuality on the way home from the movie theater." Conversely, Mike Ryan of "The Huffington Post" cited Mitch's inclusion as one of the reasons why "ParaNorman" is "remarkable." Co-director Chris Butler said that the character was explicitly connected with the film's message: "If we're saying to anyone that watches this movie don't judge other people, then we've got to have the strength of our convictions." In 2013, "ParaNorman" was the first-ever PG-rated movie nominated by GLAAD in its annual GLAAD Media Awards, but lost to "The Perks of Being a Wallflower".


title: Kim Ji-eun

text: Kim Ji-eun (Korean: 김지은; born October 9, 1993) is a South Korean actress. She is best known for her roles in television series "The Veil" (2021), "Again My Life" (2022), and "One Dollar Lawyer" (2022).


title: Kim Ji-eun

text: Kim Ji-eun officially began to work in the entertainment industry as a commercial model for Bacchus-F (2016). In order to attract the attention of actors management agencies, Kim participated in some music videos filming, worked as crew member, and did independent auditions.


title: Kim Ji-eun

text: Kim's first casting after she signed to her current agency HB Entertainment, was a 2019 film "Long Live the King". In the same year, she played her first major role in OCN's crime suspense series "Hell Is Other People".


title: Kim Ji-eun

text: In 2021, Kim gained recognition with her role as a NIS agent who joined the bureau due to a personal agenda in MBC's espionage thriller "The Veil".


title: Kim Ji-eun

text: Shortly after "The Veil", Kim was cast as a female lead for the first time in the 2022 SBS action fantasy "Again My Life", as the only daughter of a conglomerate who got embroiled in the battle of succession. In the same year she portrays a legal trainee originated from prestigious family of law practitioners with another series from SBS, a legal comedy "One Dollar Lawyer".


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: Saurabh Shukla (born 5 March 1963) is an Indian actor, screenwriter, and film director who works in Hindi films. He is famous for his roles in "Satya" (1998), "Nayak: The Real Hero" (2001), "Yuva" (2004), "Lage Raho Munna Bhai" (2006), "Barfi!" (2012), "Jolly LLB" (2013), "Kick" (2014), "PK" (2014), "Jolly LLB 2" (2017)" and Raid" (2018). He has also worked in a short documentary with Ruth Agnihotri and Rachael Agnihotri in Goa.


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: Born to Jogamaya Shukla, who was the first female tabla player of India and Shatrughan Shukla, a vocalist from Agra Gharana, Shukla's family left Gorakhpur for Delhi when he was two years old. He completed his schooling and did graduation from S.G.T.B. Khalsa College, Delhi. His professional career began in 1984 with entry into the theatre.


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: Shukla began serious theatre in 1986 with roles in plays like "A View From The Bridge" (Arthur Miller), "Look Back in Anger" (John Osborne), "Ghashiram Kotwal" (Vijay Tendulkar) and "Hayvadan". In 1991, he joined the NSD Repertoire Company – the professional wing of the National School of Drama – as an actor. The next year he got his first break when Shekhar Kapur, impressed with his work, created a role for him in "Bandit Queen".


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: Shukla also did the role of Vijay Anand's sidekick Gopi in the 1994 Doordarshan crime drama "Tehkikaat". The series was directed by Karan Razdan, but Kapur directed the first episode. He also wrote and acted in Zee TV's "9 Malabar Hill".


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: He also appeared in a recurring albeit a short role of an aamir's jasoos (chieftain's spy) in the 1990s Doordarshan TV serial Mulla Nasiruddin, which had Raghubir Yadav in the lead role. The series was based on the folklore of Mulla Nasiruddin.


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: Shukla's biggest break came when he co-wrote the script for Ram Gopal Varma's 1998 cult classic "Satya" and played the role of gangster Kallu Mama in the film. He won the Star Screen Award for Best Screenplay alongside Anurag Kashyap.


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: "Why do I make realistic films, like Satya? Because that's the kind of films I like to do. Capturing reality is very difficult and challenging," he said in a 2000 interview to Rediff.com, making it clear that he prefers realism in his scripts. In the same interview he also talked about his preferred genre of film making – comedy:


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: In 2003, he wrote the screenplay for "Calcutta Mail". He received his first award for this film, the Zee Cine Award for Best Screenplay. In 2008, he acted in his first international film, the Golden Globe and Academy Award-winning "Slumdog Millionaire", as the character Constable Srinivas. In 2013, he appeared as policeman Sudhanshu Dutta in "Barfi!", a film through which director Anurag Basu and co-actor Ranbir Kapoor, he said, "revived [him] as an actor".


title: Saurabh Shukla

text: Shukla won the National Film Award and the Screen Award for the Best Actor in a Supporting Role for his performance in "Jolly LLB".


title: Julia Koch

text: Julia Margaret Flesher Koch (born April 12, 1962) is an American socialite and philanthropist who is one of the richest women in the world. She inherited her fortune from her husband, David Koch, who died in 2019. As of August 2022, "Forbes" estimated her and her family's net worth at $57.9 billion.


title: Julia Koch

text: Julia Margaret Flesher was born on April 12, 1962. Her family came from a farming background, but when she was born, her parents, Margaret and Frederic Flesher, owned a furniture store called Flesher's. She spent her early childhood in Indianola, Iowa, then when she was eight years old her family moved to Arkansas, where her parents started a clothing store called Peggy Frederic's, which she considered "a beautiful, beautiful shop". By 1998, her mother still lived in Conway but her father had moved back to Indianola.


title: Julia Koch

text: After graduating from the University of Central Arkansas and working as a model, in 1984 Flesher moved to New York City, where she worked as fashion designer Adolfo's assistant and did fittings for Nancy Reagan.


title: Julia Koch

text: She met David Koch on a blind date in January 1991, but the date did not leave her with a good impression. She later described her reaction: "I'm glad I met that man because now I know I never want to go out with him". However, the two met again at a party later that year and started dating. She stopped working in 1993, and they got married in May 1996 at David Koch's house on Meadow Lane in Southampton.


title: Julia Koch

text: In December 1997, she made what the "New York Times" called her "New York society debut" at the Met Gala. She was co-chairwoman of the gala that year, along with Anna Wintour and Patrick McCarthy. McCarthy said she was "one of those people who occur in New York every few years...she's beautiful, she loves fashion, she knows how to entertain, she's married to an extraordinarily rich man."


title: Julia Koch

text: Julia and David Koch spent years living in an apartment at 1040 Fifth Avenue, but in 2004 they moved to an 18-room duplex at 740 Park Avenue. According to "", David Koch bought the apartment for about $17 million from the Japanese government, which previously used it to house their permanent representative to the United Nations. In 2018, the couple also bought an eight-bedroom townhouse in Manhattan from investor Joseph Chetrit for $40.25 million.


title: Julia Koch

text: David Koch died in August 2019, and Julia Koch and their three children (David Jr., Mary Julia, and John Mark) inherited 42% of Koch Industries. As a result, she was listed by "Bloomberg" as the richest woman in the world and was included on "Forbes"' list of the 10 richest women in the world in 2020.


title: Julia Koch

text: In 2022, Koch put the apartment at 740 Park Avenue on the market; a spokesperson said that she wanted to sell it because she was spending more time at houses in Southampton and Palm Beach.


title: Julia Koch

text: Koch serves as the president of the David H. Koch Foundation. She was formerly on the board of directors of the School of American Ballet.


title: Julia Koch

text: During her husband's lifetime, they made donations to institutions such as the Lincoln Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Sorcerer is a 1977 American thriller film directed and produced by William Friedkin and starring Roy Scheider, Bruno Cremer, Francisco Rabal, and Amidou. The second adaptation of Georges Arnaud's 1950 French novel "Le Salaire de la peur", it has been widely considered a remake of the 1953 film "The Wages of Fear", although Friedkin disagreed with this assessment. The plot depicts four outcasts from varied backgrounds meeting in a South American village, where they are assigned to transport cargoes of aged, poorly kept dynamite that is so unstable that it is 'sweating' its dangerous basic ingredient, nitroglycerin.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: "Sorcerer" was originally conceived as a side-project to Friedkin's next major film, "The Devil's Triangle", with a modest US$2.5 million budget. The director later opted for a bigger production, which he thought would become his legacy. The cost of "Sorcerer" was earmarked at $15 million, escalating to $22 million following a troubled production with various filming locations—primarily in the Dominican Republic—and conflicts between Friedkin and his crew. The mounting expenses required the involvement of two major film studios, Universal Pictures and Paramount Pictures, with both studios sharing the U.S. distribution and Cinema International Corporation being responsible for the international release.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The film received generally negative reviews upon its release. Its domestic (including rentals) and worldwide gross of $5.9 million and $9 million respectively did not recoup its costs. A considerable number of critics, as well as Friedkin himself, attributed the film's commercial failure to its release at roughly the same time as "Star Wars", which instantly became a pop-culture phenomenon.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The film has enjoyed a critical re-evaluation, and some critics have lauded it as an overlooked masterpiece, perhaps "the last undeclared [one] of the American '70s". Friedkin considers "Sorcerer" among his favorite works, and the most personal and difficult film he has made. Tangerine Dream's electronic music score was also acclaimed, leading the band to become popular soundtrack composers in the 1980s. After a lengthy lawsuit filed against Universal Studios and Paramount, Friedkin started supervising a digital restoration of "Sorcerer", with the new print premiering at the 70th Venice International Film Festival on August 29, 2013. Its remastered home video release on Blu-ray came out on April 22, 2014.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The film opens with a prologue that consists of four segments described by critics as "vignettes". They show the principal characters in different parts of the world and provide their backstories.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Nilo (Rabal), an elegantly dressed man, enters a flat in Veracruz. Nilo immediately executes the unsuspecting tenant with a silenced revolver and proceeds to casually walk out of the building and onto the square.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: A group of Palestinian militants disguised as Jews causes an explosion near the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem, after which they take shelter at their hideout, where they assemble weaponry and plan their escape. After getting surrounded by the Israel Defense Forces, they split up; two are killed and one is apprehended. The only one who manages to escape is Kassem (Amidou). The segment finishes as he helplessly stares from a crowd at his captured companion.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: While discussing a book his wife is editing, Victor Manzon (Cremer) discovers an anniversary gift from her: a watch with a special dedication. After meeting with the president of the Paris Stock Exchange, where he is accused of fraud, Victor is given 24 hours to provide collateral so the charges can be dropped. Victor meets his business partner and brother-in-law, Pascal, and they quarrel; Victor insists that Pascal contact his father for financial assistance. Victor dines with his wife and her friend in a glamorous restaurant; he later receives a message from a butler that Pascal is waiting outside. When he learns that Pascal's father has refused to help, Victor is adamant that they try again. He walks his partner to a car, but Pascal commits suicide. Faced with impending doom, Victor leaves both his country and wife.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: In Elizabeth, an Irish gang robs a Catholic church that is connected with a rival Italian Mafia crew and organizes cash bingo games. During the robbery, one of the Irish-American gangsters shoots and wounds one of the priests counting the proceeds of the bingo. Back in their car, the Irish gang members engage in a heated argument that causes Jackie Scanlon (Scheider), the driver, to lose concentration and collide with a truck. Everyone is killed but Jackie, who escapes with serious injuries. The wounded priest turns out to be the brother of Carlo Ricci, an Italian Mafia kingpin who also controlled the flow of money in the church and is determined to kill Jackie at all costs. Jackie meets with his friend Vinnie, who reveals his fate and finds a suitable place for him to escape. The only option Jackie has is to agree.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Kassem, Victor, and Jackie all assume fake identities and end up in Porvenir, a remote village in Colombia. Its conditions provide a stark contrast to their previous lives. The village economy is heavily reliant on an American oil company. Kassem befriends a man called 'Marquez' (John), presumably a Nazi war veteran. They all live in extreme poverty and earn meager salaries. All want out, but their savings are inadequate for emigration. After some time, Nilo arrives in the village, raising suspicions. In the meantime, an oil well explodes, and the only way to extinguish the fire is to use dynamite. Since the only available dynamite has been improperly stored in a remote depot, the nitroglycerin contained inside has become highly unstable; the faintest vibration could cause an explosion. With all other means ruled out, the only way to transport it the is to use trucks. The company seeks four drivers to man two vehicles. Kassem, Victor, Jackie and 'Marquez' are offered the job, but they have to assemble the trucks using scrap parts. Shortly before their departure, Nilo kills and replaces 'Marquez', which angers Kassem.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The four drivers embark upon a perilous journey of over , facing many hazards and internal conflicts. Despite their differences, they are forced to co-operate. They traverse a rotten bridge during a violent thunderstorm, Nilo and Jackie nearly losing their truck in the process. The team is forced to use one of the boxes of dynamite to destroy a massive fallen tree blocking their path. The rough terrain on a cliff-side road causes Kassem and Victor's truck to blow a tire, sending the truck over the cliff; it explodes and kills the pair. When Nilo and Jackie stop at the scene of the destruction, bandits surround them in an attempted robbery. They kill the bandits but Nilo is mortally wounded, soon dying from his injuries. Now alone, Jackie struggles to stay sane, overwhelmed by hallucinations and flashbacks. When his truck's engine dies just two miles short of the destination, he is forced to carry the remaining dynamite on foot.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: At the bar back in Porvenir, Jackie is given a Colombian passport and payment for the job by the oil company, as well as an offer of another job. Before he leaves, he asks a scrub woman for a dance. As the two dance, Carlo Ricci's henchmen, along with Jackie's old friend Vinnie, emerge from a taxi outside. They walk into the bar and a single gunshot is heard as the screen cuts to the end credits.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Other cast members include Peter Capell as Lartigue, Corlette's superior; Anne-Marie Deschodt as Blanche, Victor Manzon's wife, who gives him a specially engraved watch as a wedding anniversary gift, which later on Victor tries in vain to sell in exchange for a way out of Porvenir; Friedrich von Ledebur as Carlos, an owner of the El Corsario bar and a supposedly former "Third Reich marshal;" Chico Martinez as Bobby Del Rios, an explosives specialist and Corlette's advisor who assesses the situation at the oil well; Joe Spinell as "Spider", an acquaintance of Scanlon in Porvenir who takes part in the truck-driving test but fails; Rosario Almontes as Agrippa, a bar maid in El Corsario who seems to be fond of Manzon as she gives him a crucifix before his departure; Richard Holley as Billy White, a helicopter pilot who rules out dynamite in a shipment on an aircraft; Jean-Luc Bideau as Pascal, Manzon's brother-in-law who fails to receive help from his father to save their company from execution of fraud; Jacques François as Lefevre, the president of the Paris Stock Exchange, who accuses Manzon of money fraud; Gerard Murphy as Donnelly, a head of the Irish gang of which Jackie Scanlon is a member; Randy Jurgensen as Vinnie, a friend of Scanlon who directs him to the Baltimore docks from where he has to flee to a yet undisclosed location in order to evade execution from the Mafia; and Cosmo Allegretti as Carlo Ricci, a vengeful Mafia leader and a brother of a priest who was shot in New Jersey during the robbery who puts a bounty on the head of Jackie Scanlon.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The film's title refers to one of the trucks, which has the name "Sorcerer" painted across the hood (the other is named "Lazaro"); the narrative features no supernatural or magical character or event. As director William Friedkin went location scouting in Ecuador and researched the peculiar ornaments on cargo trucks he had seen there, he noticed there were names painted on them, which ranged from relatives to mythological references. Firstly he came up with the name "Lazaro" after Lazarus; then after some time struggling to find another moniker, a listen to the Miles Davis album "Sorcerer" served as an inspiration to name the other truck, though the word was painted in French: "Sorcier". Friedkin then decided to change his working title "Ballbreaker" for "Sorcerer", which he described as "an intentional but ill-advised reference to "The Exorcist"".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin elaborated on this theme in an interview with Thomas D. Clagett: In the director's opinion, the premise of "The Wages of Fear" (both the novel and the first film adaptation) seemed to him a metaphor for "the world [being] full of strangers who hated one another, but if they didn't cooperate, if they didn't work together in some way, they would blow up." Walon Green, the screenwriter, said that he and Friedkin "wanted a cynical movie where fate turns the corner for the people before they turn it themselves". Additionally, their intention was to "write a real movie about what we thought was the reality of Latin America and the presence of foreigners there today".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: During a scene in Paris involving a conversation between Victor and his wife, she reads him a memoir of a retired French Foreign Legion officer who has to make a decision whether to kill a civilian or not. The officer eventually does so, which to Victor means that he was "just another soldier". His wife, counters with an argument that "no one is just anything". For Friedkin, this phrase stands for "the theme of the film". Film critic Gloria Heifetz has added that Friedkin's direction prevents this line from becoming sentimental, and ties in with the film's finale.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin originally conceived "Sorcerer" as a "little 2.5 million in-between movie", a stepping stone to realize his next major project, "The Devil's Triangle", the planned follow-up to "The Exorcist". However, Steven Spielberg at that point had already made "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", which presumably nullified the project. Peter Biskind theorized that Friedkin had always seen Francis Ford Coppola as his competitor, so when Coppola headed to the Philippines to direct "Apocalypse Now", Friedkin went to Latin America to shoot "Sorcerer".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin's intention was not to create a remake, but to direct a film using only the same basic outline with completely original protagonists. He also wanted the film to be "grittier than Clouzot's [version], with the 'documentary feel' for which [he] had become known." Friedkin initially also wanted to get Clouzot's "Wages of Fear" re-released in American theaters but could not convince any major studio to do so. He felt that American audiences had very limited exposure to Clouzot's film and that the English-speaking world in general was not very familiar with it.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin appointed Walon Green as the film's screenwriter. The director got to know Green in the 1960s, and was since highly impressed with his work in Sam Peckinpah's western "The Wild Bunch". Friedkin described Green as a multilingual person, fluently speaking French, Spanish, Italian, and German, as well as having "an encyclopedic knowledge of classical music and literature". Prior to writing the script, Green expressed enthusiasm about the project and suggested Friedkin read Gabriel García Márquez's novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude". Friedkin described it as "another lifechanging work" which served as a workprint for their adaptation of "Wages of Fear". The story outline was created by both Friedkin and Green, and the script was finished in four months. Gerard Murphy, who portrayed the head of the Irish gang during the Elizabeth church robbery, was a real-life criminal involved in a similar heist. Friedkin utilized details from Murphy's stories and used them as an inspiration. The remaining members of the gang were "nonactors but part of Gerry's world", including one IRA member.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Some reviewers likened certain elements of the film to Werner Herzog's 1972 movie "Aguirre, the Wrath of God", such as Alex Peterson, who thought both movies are notable for their "ability to create a truly threatening atmosphere out of a lush jungle location, and for asking the dubiously pertinent question of what greed and crazy determination might bring to men." This connection was explored further in Friedkin's 2013 memoir, "The Friedkin Connection", when the director likened himself to a character from another Herzog movie; in the process of making the film, he "had become like Fitzcarraldo, the man who built an opera house in the Brazilian jungle."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Several critics compared the movie to John Huston's "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre". Phil Mucci indicated a similarity in terms of the premise as a "tale of desperate men in desperate times, bound together by fate and circumstance," and Thomas D. Clagett likened Jackie Scanlon's characteristics and appearance to Fred C. Dobbs (played by Humphrey Bogart) from Huston's movie. According to Clagett, who cites Friedkin, this was intentional. Phil Mucci notes the visual influence of French New Wave, as well as Gillo Pontecorvo's "The Battle of Algiers", the latter comment also mirrored by Shaun Crawford, Tom Stempel in his book "Framework: A History of Screenwriting in the American Film", and Ken Dancyger in "The Technique of Film and Video Editing: History, Theory, and Practice", where he states that by employing similar techniques to Pontecorvo, in the prologues he "establish[es] credibility" as well as makes "[these] histories as realistic as possible." Stempel additionally alluded the film's episodic structure to Robert Altman's work. Crawford also observes that the film possesses "cinema verite sensibilities", which in his opinion allow the director to capture "its grimy realism". Dancynger also touches upon this thread and assesses the Jerusalem prologue sequence as shot entirely in "cinema verite fashion".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Before the actual production could take place, William Friedkin had to resolve the problem with licensing, because Henri-Georges Clouzot did not own the rights for the intellectual property. It was owned by the novelist Georges Arnaud:


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Upon Friedkin revealing his intentions to Clouzot, Clouzot was surprised Friedkin wanted to reimagine "Wages of Fear" because of enormous praise he had received at the time for his two recent pictures. Friedkin offered Clouzot a percentage of the film's shares, for which the French director was thankful. In 2013, after a screening of "Sorcerer" at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Friedkin mentioned that he "went to Georges Arnaud's home through his attorney, and he was very pleased to have this done because he didn't like Clouzot's film, if you can believe that".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Originally, Friedkin envisioned an all-star cast of Steve McQueen, Marcello Mastroianni, and Lino Ventura.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: McQueen was the director's first choice for the role eventually taken by Roy Scheider, as a small-time criminal named Jackie Scanlon who ends up a fugitive from the law and the Mafia after a robbery of a New Jersey church. Scanlon's role was written specifically for McQueen after Friedkin met him in person and he turned out to be very keen on the idea. McQueen loved the script, and even went as far as to say "This is the best script I've ever read", but did not want to leave the country or wife Ali MacGraw at the time. Instead, he proposed that McGraw become an associate producer or that a part be written for her in the film; however, Friedkin declined both his wishes, stating that "there's hardly a major role as a woman…and we don't have associate producers who don't do anything, we're not going to make her an AP." It eventually led to McQueen's declining the offer, upsetting the director greatly, and making him later regret this decision. Later on, the script was passed to Marcello Mastroianni, who was offered the role of Nilo (eventually assigned to Francisco Rabal), which he accepted.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Manzon's role was originally intended for one of the most prominent European actors, Lino Ventura. Despite Ventura's concerns about his English, he also initially approved Friedkin's proposal. However, after McQueen backed out, Ventura was hesitant to take part in the movie. Mastroianni was still interested but had problems related to his daughter's custody after his separation from Catherine Deneuve, which eventually made him decline the director's offer. After the disagreement with McQueen, Friedkin approached Robert Mitchum who, despite appreciating the script, sternly declined, asking Friedkin "Why would I want to go to Ecuador for two or three months to fall out of a truck? I can do that outside my house." Another candidate for Scanlon's role was Warren Oates, but since the movie's budget escalated beyond $10 million, the studio decided that "[his] name wasn't big enough to carry that big a picture." They eventually worked together on Friedkin's follow-up to "Sorcerer", titled "The Brink's Job".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: It was not until Universal executive Sidney Sheinberg suggested Scheider, that Friedkin finally managed to employ an actor for the leading role of Jackie Scanlon. They had previously worked on "The French Connection" together; however, they had lost contact after Friedkin—at William Peter Blatty's insistence—had refused to cast Scheider as Father Karras in "The Exorcist". With Universal unenthusiastic about the project, acquiring Scheider, who had recently enjoyed enormous success in Steven Spielberg's "Jaws", made the studio more hopeful and inclined to let the film materialize. Production notes on the 1998 Universal DVD release tell a different story, noting that the casting of Scheider as Scanlon/Dominguez was a "foregone conclusion" and "the ideal (perhaps the only) choice for the role" since Friedkin had directed him previously in "The French Connection". After casting Scheider in the main role, Lino Ventura refused to take second billing to him. On the other hand, the actor chosen by Friedkin to replace Ventura turned out to be Bruno Cremer, who, among other pictures prior to "Sorcerer", had played in Costa-Gavras's "Section spéciale" and whom Friedkin described as a "good actor". The only actor who was Friedkin's original choice was the French-Moroccan Amidou, who played the Palestinian terrorist, Kassem. Friedkin was so impressed with his performance in Claude Lelouch's "La Vie, l'amour, la mort" (released in 1968) that he wrote down his name immediately upon seeing the movie, expecting to collaborate with him one day.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: As for casting in general, the director expressed his dissatisfaction with the process. He felt "Sorcerer" "needed stars" and claimed that the actors hired for the roles of Scanlon and Manzon were his fifth, sixth or seventh preferred choices. Spanish actor Francisco Rabal, however, was his "about second or third choice". Friedkin said that he wanted Rabal for the role of "Frog One" in "The French Connection" because he loved his performance in Luis Buñuel's "Belle de Jour", but the casting director mistakenly got Fernando Rey instead. It was not until "Sorcerer" came along that Friedkin and Rabal finally worked together. Scanlon's role was also offered to Clint Eastwood and Jack Nicholson, neither of whom was willing to travel to the Dominican Republic. Despite liking Cremer, Friedkin felt that this role would benefit from the presence of Jean-Paul Belmondo or Lino Ventura. The abundance of foreign actors on the cast list prompted Sidney Sheinberg to ask the director whether he would like them to have Anglicized pseudonyms.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin recalls working with Scheider as difficult, stating the actor had frequent mood swings which did not occur during the filming of "The French Connection" and theorized that after achieving stardom with "Jaws" he became "difficult", which contrasted with his attitude from "The French Connection", where he "would've down in front of an elevated train" for Friedkin. The director stated Scheider at times was "impossible to talk to" and completely indifferent towards any of his suggestions. He summarized the experience by saying the arduous production schedule and difficult conditions in the Dominican Republic were most likely the reasons behind their difficult relationship. Likewise, Scheider also had his reservations about the work with Friedkin, on the one hand praising him as "extraordinarily gifted filmmaker, who told stories with pictures and shot beautifully" but despite his erudition, he was marred with distrusting attitude which made everyone around him very tense. According to Diane Kachmar, Friedkin believed that he inspired others to achieve great results, but Scheider did not favor such working conditions. However, Scheider also admitted that only a director of Friedkin's stature could have persuaded him to perform all the life-threatening scenes he did, and added that upon seeing the dailies he "knew it was worth it". Despite the mutual tensions, the director rated Scheider highly, did not hold any grudges, and regretted he did not receive more recognition for his body of work. However, their relationship eventually "drifted apart".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: According to Friedkin cited by Kachmar, his artistic intent was to shoot the entire film without "sentiment" or "melodrama", rendering it completely devoid of "heartfelt moments". Friedkin's oeuvre has been frequently noted by critics for its lack of "clear-cut heroes or villains", and the director himself admitted that he believes in neither. Thus, he envisioned all four principal characters to be anti-heroes and "hard to 'root for'". Friedkin felt very confident about himself at the time, thinking he was "bulletproof [and] nothing was going to stop [him]", and felt he "could take an audience through this with not the most likable people on Earth." The director also stated that the line "action is character" from F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel "The Great Gatsby" served as an inspiration for him in all the movies he made, including "Sorcerer".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Serdar Yegulalp notes distinctive characteristics and traits of each of the protagonists and praises Friedkin's execution by saying that the film "never falls into the trap of having each character shine on cue: they only do their thing when they’re backed up against the abyss, much as we all do in the real world" and adding that "their desperation's not a pose".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Prior to the post-production process, the movie contained a significantly larger amount of dialogue, and a detailed analysis of the European and American cuts reveals that certain scenes involving the relationship between Scanlon and Nilo, as well as presenting some of Nilo's motives, were removed.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Unlike "The Wages of Fear", in which the main characters were given two trucks in mint condition by the oil company, their counterparts depicted in "Sorcerer" had to be assembled by the protagonists themselves, using parts salvaged from wrecks. The production got two GMC 2-1/2-ton capacity M211 military trucks, first deployed in 1952 during the Korean War as transport trucks. Using the knowledge gained from the visits to Ecuador, Friedkin employed a Dominican artisan in order to embellish the vehicles with symbols and paintings based on the names "Lazaro" and "Sorcerer".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin chose Dick Bush as his director of photography after seeing the film version of the rock opera "Tommy", directed by Ken Russell, and after finding out that Bush had filmed Gustav Mahler's biography as well as collaborated with Lindsay Anderson, whom Friedkin regarded highly. Scheider's then-wife, Cynthia Scheider, was an assistant film editor who had previously worked with Bud Smith on "The Exorcist". Since shooting the film required a prolonged stay in South America, Scheider asked Friedkin if she could stay with him and have a job in an editing capacity. The director fulfilled his wish and was reportedly "delighted". "Sorcerer" was filmed during a ten-month production schedule, using approximately 1,200 camera set-ups. The director attempted to complete the picture "without relying on dialogue", and "telling the story through imagery" instead. In the film's pressbook Friedkin states that for him creating a film is multi-faceted experience: "[e]very film is actually three films[.] There is the film you conceive and plan. There is the film you actually shoot. And there is the film that emerges with you in the editing room".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Principal photography commenced on location in Paris and depicted Victor Manzon's backstory. The sequence filmed in Jerusalem was realized with cooperation of Israeli security forces who portrayed themselves in the pursuit scenes. The mock explosion that occurred during the Jerusalem scenes had such power that it broke a window of the city's mayor's house, which was located away. The detonation was controlled by Nick Dimitri, a stuntman portraying an Israeli soldier, who positioned himself too close to explosives which resulted in injuries. However, after an hour the director ordered a second take, being adamant about the previous accident. Dimitri praised Friedkin's craftmanship by saying that "when you watch the movie and everything gets obliterated, you can't even tell if it's the first or second take". Moreover, during the realization of the sequence, an actual bombing took place in the vicinity, which prompted Friedkin to capture additional footage which in his opinion added "a documentary reality". The fourth prologue vignette, taking place in Elizabeth, New Jersey, contains a scene involving a car crash. It took twelve takes and approximately ten days to achieve what Friedkin intended. The director recalls the sequence as seemingly "impossible to shoot", having involved several stuntmen from New York, the crew wrecked seven vehicles over the course of a week, without satisfying the director's intents. Friedkin then put himself in the passenger seat to evaluate the negative aspects of the scene's execution. The director became fed up with the situation and decided to listen to David Salven, the line producer, who suggested that they employ a well-known specialist, Joie Chitwood Jr., whom Friedkin described as "short, stocky, part Indian, self-assured, and fearless". After Friedkin supplied him with all the necessary information about the set's infrastracture, Chitwood meticulously analyzed the surroundings himself, and ordered the special effects technicians to construct a forty-feet long slanted ramp which would allow him to "drive the car at top speed on two wheels, flip it in midair, and crash into a fire hydrant". The construction took three days, and the stunt was successful during its very first take.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin said the most important scene in the film was "the bridge-crossing sequence, wherein the two trucks have to separately cross an old wooden suspension bridge that appears completely unstable". He also deemed it the most arduous scene he has ever filmed. The bridge was designed by John Box using carefully hidden hydraulic components allowing control of the movements of the bridge and the trucks alike. Its first iteration was constructed in the Dominican Republic over a period of three months, and it required $1 million to complete. However, as soon as it was finished, Friedkin's crew faced a problem of abnormally low rainfall. During the construction process, the river's water level decreased dramatically, and by the time the bridge was assembled, the river had become completely dry, despite the assurance of local engineers that there had not been any recorded fluctuations in water level during the dry season. Studio executives suggested Friedkin devise a less sophisticated scene, but instead he continued to realize his vision in different locations. Thus, John Box went to scout locations in Mexico and found that the Papaloapan River possessed similar characteristics. The previously constructed bridge had to be disassembled and re-anchored. Friedkin's crew's arrival caused a major disturbance in the vicinity among the locals because of his reputation as a director of "The Exorcist". However, a part of the population offered help to finish the structure. Ultimately, this river also became stricken with drought, which forced the application of some practical effects to complete the scene. In order to create artificial rain, Friedkin employed sewage pumps draining water from the river and diverting it to a sprinkler system. This scene alone, which lasts 12 minutes, took several months to complete and cost approximately three million dollars. The director has claimed that during this sequence, the truck teetering against the ropes actually tipped over into the river several times, causing numerous retakes.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The stunt coordinator for the film was Bud Ekins, who was Steve McQueen's stunt double in "The Great Escape". He was friends with the film editor, Bud Smith, who recalls Ekins being "as cool as cucumber". In some cases stuntmen were employed throughout the making of the film but generally speaking the principal actors acted as their own doubles and were actual truck drivers. For instance, since Roy Scheider's character Jackie Scanlon was meant to be a mob's wheelman, he had to undertake a special preparation for maneuvering a vintage truck with the purpose of gaining the necessary driving skills. He summarized the experience as "rehearsing to stay alive". Scheider has emphasized that no rear-screen projection or any other kinds of "trick photography" were used, due to the distance between the cameras, the vehicles and the surrounding terrain. In a 1977 interview for "The New York Times", Scheider said that shooting "Sorcerer" "made "Jaws" look like a picnic." He mentioned that the stuntmen were unhappy because of the fact the leading actors performed their own stunts, and added that the scene involving crossing a suspension rope bridge is "what really happened". Scheider called it the most perilous sequence he has ever taken part in. Amidou, in an interview for the "Morocco Times" in 2005, stated that out of all movies in his oeuvre, "Sorcerer" left the most lasting impression on him since he "refused to have a substitute and paid for it physically."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin antagonized Paramount, using a Gulf and Western corporate photo for a scene that featured the evil board of directors of the fictional company which hired the men to deliver dynamite. Walon Green recalled the experience in the following way:


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: To create four prologues for the characters' respective backstories, Friedkin shot each of the vignettes on location, respectively in Paris for Victor Manzon, Jerusalem for Kassem, Elizabeth, New Jersey, for Jackie Scanlon, and Veracruz, Mexico, for Nilo. The main part of the film was, on the other hand, originally meant to be shot in Ecuador, which impressed Friedkin tremendously. However, such a diversity of locations caused serious concerns about the budget. After strong opposition from Lew Wasserman, who was the owner of Universal Studios at the time, Friedkin had to opt out from shooting there. The director eventually settled on the Dominican Republic, after receiving a green light from the studio's executives. In a memoir, "Infamous Players: A Tale of Movies, the Mob (And Sex)", film producer Peter Bart theorized that the owner of Gulf and Western, Charlie Bluhdorn, supported the Dominican Republic financially and intended to create a film-making centre there. Paul Rowlands, a critic, stated that "it's likely the decision to film in the Dominican Republic was one favoured by Bluhdorn."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: After scouting locations with Walon Green and John Box, the production designer, they chose La Altagracia village as the main location. Friedkin described the place as "a prison without walls" with a "sense of timeless poverty and persecution".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Although the majority of the film was filmed in the Dominican Republic, Friedkin did not hesitate to look for other locales to achieve the desired effect. One of the most notable ones is depicted in the film's climax. It features a surrealistic landscape on Navajo Nation lands in the Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness, New Mexico:


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: During a sequence involving the detonation of an enormous kaoba tree, Friedkin was faced with a problem of inadequate explosive power. Initially, Marcel Vercoutere, a special effects man who previously worked with the director on "The Exorcist", was to be responsible for the explosion. However, it did not achieve the required effect and barely damaged the tree. This prompted Friedkin to reach for the services of an arsonist hailing from Queens, New York, going by the pseudonym "Marvin the Torch", who arrived at the Dominican Republic three days after the call and utilizing flammable materials obliterated the tree in one take the following morning. A week into the shooting in the Dominican Republic, Friedkin and his crew went to Los Angeles to process the film and view dailies. The director described the prologues as "beautifully shot", but he was dissatisfied with the jungle scenes which he deemed "underexposed" and "dark". He told Dick Bush a reshoot would be necessary. Bush, on the other hand, argued that filming should have taken place on a stage where he could have adequately adjusted the lighting. The response reminded Friedkin of his previous problems on the set of "The Boys in the Band" and offended him, as from the very beginning he had wanted to shoot the entire film on location. Upon seeing the underexposed scenes, Bush reportedly "lost confidence" and was subsequently dismissed, which forced Friedkin to employ a new camera crew. He replaced Bush with John M. Stephens with whom he had worked under David L. Wolper. Stephens applied necessary changes, including the employment of reflectors balancing "the deep shadows of the tall trees", as well as replacing lenses and film stock. This resulted in a leap of cinematographic quality which delighted the director, who has said "the locations looked beautiful to the eye".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Apart from Bush, Friedkin had a feud with the chief Teamsters representative whom he dismissed at some point and which prompted the director to find another trucker crew. The director also fired five production managers, which upset Scheider, who said that he was "tired of going to the airport and saying goodbye to them," as well as adding that he was the only person Friedkin could not drop, as he was the leading actor. David Salven, initially chosen as a line producer, had to quit for personal reasons, as he was facing the possibility of a divorce. Friedkin regretted this situation, as he praised Salven greatly for his previous contributions to his movies. He was replaced by Ian Smith, whom the director described as "experienced and efficient". In Tuxtepec, Mexico, where the suspension bridge scene was filmed, an undercover federal agent informed Friedkin that several of his crew members, including grip crew men, stuntmen and a makeup artist, were in the possession of drugs and were urged to leave the country or face prison sentences. It reportedly took two weeks to replace the crew workers. Besides internal on-set conflicts, Friedkin, cited by Mucci, said that approximately fifty people "had to leave the film for either injury or gangrene," as well as food poisoning and malaria. In "The Friedkin Connection" he added that "almost half the crew went into the hospital or had to be sent home." Friedkin himself lost fifty pounds () and was stricken with malaria, which was diagnosed after the film's premiere. Tim Applegate concluded an account of the troubled film-making of "Sorcerer" by comparing Friedkin to Francis Ford Coppola during the production of "Apocalypse Now:" "Friedkin took his camera crew to the jungle and never quite returned."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The sound design crew included Jean-Louis Ducarme, with whom Friedkin had worked on "The Exorcist" and of whom he thought very highly. He was joined by Robert Knudson, who also was a sound effects supervisor for Friedkin's previous movie as well as Robert Glass and Richard Tyler. The sound crew employed distorted samples of tiger and cougar roars for the truck engines' sound. C.J. Schexnayder noted that such a technical exercise was "relatively unique for the period"; but, over the years, techniques such as these became a staple of film-making. The sound design eventually garnered the movie's sole Academy Award nomination, which it lost to "Star Wars".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: "Sorcerer" marked the first Hollywood film score for the German krautrock and electronic band Tangerine Dream. William Friedkin, during his visit in Germany, attended their concert in a derelict church in the Black Forest. The band seemed to him "on the cutting edge of the electronic synthesizer sound" that soon would become a staple in mainstream culture. He assessed their music as a mixture of classical music played on synthesizers and "the new pop sound", and described the experience as "mesmerizing". In an interview for Evolution Garden Music Award, Edgar Froese, then-band leader, recalled how he initially rejected the commission, thinking that Friedkin would score "The Exorcist II", about which Froese was not enthusiastic. However, upon learning Friedkin intended to reimagine "Wages of Fear", Froese called Friedkin back and asked for video material to be worked on, but Friedkin suggested the band create the score based solely on their impressions of the script, without seeing a single minute of video footage. After initially meeting in Paris, Froese reports Friedkin was delighted with their work; Froese added that they "never had to change anything on that score" and summarized their involvement as "the most uncomplicated work we did for Hollywood". Upon receiving the commissioned audio material, Friedkin was inspired to edit the film according to the music, which he received in a raw, unabridged form.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Friedkin, an admirer of the band, stated in the liner notes for the soundtrack that "[h]ad [he] heard them sooner [he] would have asked them to score ["The Exorcist"]", and that he considers the film and the score to be "inseparable". Apart from Tangerine Dream's score, some excerpts from Keith Jarrett's "Hymns/Spheres" were employed. Friedkin also featured one licensed song, "I'll Remember April", by jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker, and a cover version of "So What" by Miles Davis. For the film's screening, Paramount and William Friedkin prepared specific instructions regarding music: they demanded a three-and-half-minute musical overture to be played prior to each screening, and prohibited any alterations to it.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: In 2019, the soundtrack was released on green vinyl by Waxwork Records. It included the complete score by Tangerine Dream and liner notes by William Friedkin.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Paramount Pictures and Universal Pictures reached an agreement in which Paramount would distribute the film in the eastern United States while Universal would distribute the film in the western United States"." "Sorcerer" opened theatrically in the United States on June 24, 1977, and ended up being a box office flop, grossing $5.9 million domestically and $9 million worldwide. Roger Ebert estimated that at the time, the film would have needed a gross of around $45–50m to just "break even". It was released a month after George Lucas' runaway box-office smash of 1977, "Star Wars"; Mann Theatres wanted to keep "Star Wars" at Mann's Chinese Theater, but Paramount insisted on the company fulfilling its contract for "Sorcerer". Warned by "Sorcerer" film editor Bud Smith, Friedkin and his wife Jeanne Moreau watched the science-fiction epic at Mann's Chinese Theater and nervously saw the gigantic crowds that attended, knowing that his film would soon replace it. Friedkin's fears were correct; when "Sorcerer" debuted at the theater, it was so unsuccessful by comparison that "Star Wars" quickly returned. Friedkin agreed with this assessment during an interview on the "Bug" DVD.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Several critics theorized that another probable factor in the film's box office failure was the confusion related to its title. Cyriaque Lamar of Cracked.com notes that "[a]udiences expecting mystical weirdness a la "The Exorcist" walked out of theaters" which in turn forced distributors to put "ads that Sorcerer was 'NOT A FILM ABOUT THE SUPERNATURAL'." Film critic Gene Siskel thought "Sorcerer" was a "very bad title". To him the title might have indicated a certain likeness to "The Exorcist" and thought the audiences at the time were either bored with yet another film about exorcisms or that was precisely what they wanted and upon seeing the movie, they got confused, asking themselves "where's the devil?" Siskel also thought each of the production companies would think the other one would handle the promotion, and nobody perceived it as a "sole project of their own, it was dropped in-between them." On the other hand, Roger Ebert expressed his disappointment about the movie's box office performance by saying that "you could make more than that just by opening in the first week, people stumbling into a wrong theater looking for Bruce Lee," as well as blamed Universal and Paramount for the lack of support. Friedkin stated that his attitude throughout the making of the film "alienated the top management of two studios", and as a consequence they did not feel compelled to support it.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Furthermore, the opening sixteen minutes contain no English language, which made the audiences think that it was a foreign subtitled film, and caused walk-outs. Consequently, this prompted movie theatres to put a disclaimer on lobby cards asserting that for the most part, it was an English-language film.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: After the film's poor reception, its financial disaster prompted Universal executives to void their contract with Friedkin immediately. Friedkin moved to France with Moreau where he recuperated from a malaria infection contracted during the filming, and wanted to sever ties with American film industry. Despite "Sorcerer"s failure, in a 2013 interview for "The National", Friedkin stated that in retrospect he never stopped believing in the movie: "I measure the success or failure of a film on one thing – how close I came to my vision of it."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: "Sorcerer" was not received as well by the public or film critics as Friedkin's previous two films had been. American movie reviewer D. K. Holm hinted that all criticisms might have stemmed from the very fact that Friedkin even dared to reimagine a French classic.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: In Leonard Maltin's annual "TV Movies" ratings book, the film receives only two-and-a-half out of four stars, with the critique, "Expensive remake of "The Wages of Fear" never really catches hold despite a few astounding scenes." In Leslie Halliwell's "Halliwell's Film Guide", the evaluation is even more harsh, and the author found the film "truly insulting", going as far as to say: "Why anyone would want to spend 20 million dollars on a remake of "The Wages of Fear," do it badly, and give it a misleading title is anybody's guess. The result is dire." Andrew Sarris in his July 18, 1977, review for "The Village Voice" summarized the film as "a visual and aural textbook on everything that is wrong with current movies," as well as stating that the movie reset Friedkin's status to the beginning of his career, and compared him unfavourably to Clouzot, John Huston and David Lean, declaring that "he has not come close to matching their craftsmanship." Robert C. Cumbow in the September 1977 issue of "Movietone News" also panned the film, criticizing camera placement as "faulty", which in his opinion led to substandard exposition. Moreover, he also deemed the film's editing "ridiculous" and thought "Sorcerer" lacked character involvement. John Marlowe of "The Miami News" assessed the movie's dialogues unfavourably, stating that ""Sorcerer's" dialog is kept to such a minimum that not only you don't feel for these four losers, but you never really get to know them." He also considered the film's mixture of realist and surrealist moments as "pain in the mind". Peter Biskind described the film as "self-consciously arty and pretentious [...] fatally trapped between America and Europe, commerce and art," claiming the end result represented "the worst of both worlds", as well as noting that the audience of the time was strikingly different from the one that adored "The French Connection". "Films Illustrated" summarized "Sorcerer" as "below the usual par", in spite of the involvement of reputable lead actor Scheider and a "topnotch director", Friedkin. In the August 1997 issue of "The Progressive", Kenneth Turan praised the movie's narrative set-up; however, he thought that in spite of it, it was impossible to attach oneself to the characters. He concluded the review by saying that with "films like this, feeling is everything." One complaint was that some of the scene cuts were too abrupt. Gene Siskel claimed that the characters "seem to be a little cold", as well as expressing an opinion that the special effects overpowered the protagonists.


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text: John Simon wrote of how Friedkin 'spent twenty-one million dollars to perpetuate a film that could be usefully studied in courses on how not to make movies'.


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text: James Monaco praised the cinematography and craftsmanship, and stated that "Friedkin has a commitment to this story," but concluded that "somehow technique overwhelms meaning and emotion." Furthermore, he described the picture as "more restrained" than Friedkin's earlier work, as well as calling it "a grandly naive gesture of self-indulgence," and trivialized his effort to a mere attempt at remaking "his hero[,] Clouzot".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: David Badder, in "Monthly Film Bulletin", was of the opinion that even if the film had been truncated, it would not improve its quality. He described "Sorcerer" as "remarkably lacklustre", and did not appreciate the unstable tone of the movie which he called "impenetrably obscure". Additionally, he considered Scheider's role to be severely underdeveloped and "consist[ing] of meaningful stares off camera and mournful grimaces."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: On the other hand, "Sorcerer" garnered some acclaim from several major critics, including the "Chicago Sun-Times's" Roger Ebert, "The New York Times's" chief film critic Vincent Canby, and Jack Kroll of "Newsweek".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Ebert, in a November 1979 episode of "Sneak Previews" with Gene Siskel, called the film an "overlooked classic", and was shocked that the film "was so completely overlooked" despite starring Academy Award nominee Roy Scheider and being directed by William Friedkin, an Oscar winner. Furthermore, he stated the movie had "lots of fun" and praised the suspension bridge scene in particular, saying it "is maybe the most astonishing scene of the whole film. It's a combination of desperation, suspense and great special effects as Roy Scheider and his partners try to maneuver a giant truck filled with nitrogliceryne through the heart of this jungle across a suspension bridge." Moreover, he emphasized that "Sorcerer" was "on a level way above most action pictures," and called it "a labor of love for director William Friedkin," and even went as far as to say that "the jungle scenes, the rain and flood, the fire catastrophe are among the most exciting scenes I've ever seen." As far as the themes are concerned, his impression of Friedkin's intentions was that "he wanted to show human behavior at its extremes; men in torment to complete a life-or-death mission against all odds and discovering their own limits at the same time." Ebert considered "Sorcerer" one of the top 10 films of 1977.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Canby called "Sorcerer" "a good little melodrama surrounded by pulp" and praised Scheider's and Cremer's performances, which he thought were "extremely good"; Scheider brought "the dominant note of reckless desperation". On the other hand, he thought the picture "should have been much, much tighter and less cinematically grand." In addition, he thought the movie would benefit from a different title to separate itself from "The Exorcist". Kroll, in his "Newsweek" review, called the movie "the toughest, most relentless American film in a long time."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The film today is more positively received by professional film critics. The review-aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes indicates "Sorcerer" has an 80% approval rating, with an average score 7.4 out of 10, based on 44 reviews. The website's critical consensus reads, ""Sorcerer", which obstinately motors along on its unpredictable speed, features ambitious sequences of insane white-knuckle tension." On Metacritic the film has a score of 68% based on reviews from 13 critics. Numerous outlets noted that "Sorcerer" is now a subject of critical revaluation and rejuvenated interest, opposed to other less-known films of its era. Certain contemporary critics and artists also declared that Friedkin's adaptation of "Wages of Fear" novel surpasses that of H. G. Clouzot's. This trend also led to a revisionism of Clouzot's "Wages of Fear" which is now unfavourably criticized regarding certain aspects in comparison to Friedkin's version.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Film critic Robert C. Cumbow, who heavily criticized the film in "Movietone News" (September 1977) at the time of release, has since reconsidered his initial thoughts and added an afterword in 2010 where he admits he now "read[s] it with embarrassment" and now recognizes elements he previously identified as "inconclusive" as aspects of "Friedkin's narrative economy, visceral impact, and avoidance of visual cliché"; he closed his remarks that his view was a gradual and a long process.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: On March 16, 2001, writer-director Peter Hanson summarized that "Sorcerer" contrasts with frequent self-indulgence of the 1970s and stated that the film is tremendously thrilling with a great deal of tension which he attributed to the plot's construction as "a probing descent into the psyche of an archetypal character driven insane by circumstance". He also praised the bridge crossing scene and lauded it "one of the most elaborately filmed suspense sequences in cinema history", noting an overwhelming amount of camera set-ups which in his opinion amounted to creating "an exruciating level of tension" and such dedication is palpable throughout the whole film.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: American movie reviewer D. K. Holm, in his 2005 book "Film Soleil", described the film as "superior to both its model and the novel from which both are loosely taken", as well as deeming the opening vignettes as an "innovation". According to Holm, one of the most prominent threads in "Sorcerer" is that "coping with frustration is the 'journey' of life", which in his opinion "excellently set[s] up" the cliffhanger finale.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Academy Award nominee, screenwriter and director Josh Olson, most famous for his screenplay for "A History of Violence", made a video review of Sorcerer for the "Trailers from Hell" webseries in 2007. He praised the movie highly, stating that it is Friedkin's best effort (""Sorcerer" is Friedkin at the top of his game") and was "at least equal to the original." He also applauded the atmosphere, which he said had "a wonderful tone to it and a real sense of dread and desperation [...] it's tight and suspenseful, every scene grabs you by the collar, and it's beautifully shot. You can feel the humidity down there in South America. You can feel the sweat on the sticks of dynamite." He concluded the review by saying that the only aspect in which the movie failed was the fact that it came out around the same time as "Star Wars". Olson felt that "the movie deserved a huge audience" as well as fantasizing that "somewhere there's an alternate universe where "Sorcerer" is a massive game-changing hit in Hollywood and I'm doing "Trailers from Hell" commentary on some unknown cult classic called "Star Wars". In that world Hollywood has spent the next 30 years making smart, edgy movies for grown-ups, the literacy rate is 100%, we haven't been in a war since Vietnam and world hunger is just a memory."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: On August 21, 2009, author Stephen King posted an article in "Entertainment Weekly" entitled "Stephen King's Reliable Rentals". In his list of "20 [movies] that never disappoint," King placed the original "Wages of Fear" at #2 and Friedkin's "Sorcerer" at #1, stating that although "Wages of Fear" "is considered one of the greatest movies of the modern age", he preferred "Sorcerer", and stated that Scheider's Role as Jackie Scanlon was one of the two best roles in his entire career, as well as saying that the film "generate[s] suspense through beautiful simplicity".


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: A prominent English film critic, Mark Kermode, also expressed his appreciation for the movie, saying that he had "got a fondness for William Friedkin's version of "Wages of Fear"," however adding that "only an idiot would argue that "Sorcerer" is a better movie than "Wages of Fear"."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The film's European as well as Australian cinema release cut 28 minutes from the original (but not in France, where the movie was distributed in its full-length version). In most regions of the world it was also retitled as "Wages of Fear" and distributed by Cinema International Corporation (later renamed as United International Pictures), a joint venture between Universal and Paramount specifically established for overseas distribution. This version opens in the village with the drivers already present, and ends with the delivery of explosives. The cuts were made by the international distributor Cinema International Corporation, without Friedkin's consent in order to obtain more screenings. Friedkin referred to this cut as a "mutilated" version of his work. The opening vignettes are somewhat retained, albeit heavily shortened and inserted as flashbacks. Although the European cut is shorter, there are almost sixteen minutes of unique footage not shown in the original American theatrical version.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The aforementioned changes were approved by Verna Fields and commissioned to Jim Clark, who reluctantly agreed, and Cynthia Scheider. Fields was a Universal Studios executive who thought shortening and restructuring the movie would increase the film's commercial potential. Scheider was also interested in applying those changes, offering his cooperation. Jim Clark was reportedly assured by Fields that Friedkin permitted changes, but was very suspicious about the authenticity of this claim. Therefore, Clark wrote an indemnity preventing Friedkin from any form of interference. Some additional dialogue written by Clark and Ken Levinson was later dubbed in. The studio did not possess the original work print; hence it was forced to work on the combined print. Jim Clark said the cut was "at best, passable" and was of the opinion that if he "had left Friedkin's version alone, it would have had exactly the same fate."


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: The film's release on video was held up for many years; executives at Paramount and Universal argued it was ownership issues that was preventing a release, though a Universal spokesperson suggested that a lack of public interest might be another reason. A VHS version of "Sorcerer" was released on October 4, 1990. A laserdisc release followed on December 15, 1990. The DVD was released in the U.S. and Canada on November 17, 1998, and used the laserdisc transfer presented in a 1.33:1 non-widescreen version, which is not its original theatrical aspect ratio; it was shown in cinemas at a ratio of 1.85:1. However, since widescreen televisions have become popular, Friedkin has allowed many of his other films to be released on DVD in their original widescreen formats ("The French Connection", "Cruising", "To Live and Die in L.A.").


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: In September 2013, Friedkin announced that new, remastered home video releases on Blu-ray and DVD were supposed to be released on April 14, 2014, however, both ended up being pushed to April 22. While the 2014 Blu-ray release contains a new, digitally remastered version of the movie, its DVD counterpart is simply a reissued version of the previous DVD release, and has not been authorized by Friedkin, who himself disowned it, and advised to avoid purchasing it. Furthermore, the director announced that he would supervise the remastering process for its proper DVD re-release, which hit US stores in August. In the US Blu-ray had no extra features, but was accompanied by a booklet with production stills and an excerpt of Friedkin's memoir "The Friedkin Connection", and was well-received upon release, with good reviews praising the quality of the transfer and reaching #1 in Drama and # 2 in Action/Adventure on Amazon.com. However, in the UK Blu-ray was released on November 6, 2017 and included a 74 minute ‘In Conversation’ film with the director, conducted by director Nicolas Winding Refn.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: Crew members Robert Knudson, Robert Glass, Richard Tyler and Jean-Louis Ducarme were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Sound at the 50th Academy Awards in 1978 for work on this film.


title: Sorcerer (film)

text: "Sorcerer"s box office flop status had since led to comparisons with other financial failures of the time, particularly Michael Cimino's "Heaven's Gate", as well as Francis Ford Coppola's "One from the Heart" and Martin Scorsese's "New York, New York". Critics argued that the fiasco of these films, among others, contributed to ending a period of auteur approach to the American cinema that was prominent in the 1970s.