Convoy

From one great director's dregs to another...

Convoy (1978) is an awful film, and arguably the nadir of Sam Peckinpah's career. It's possible that no film based on a C.W. McCall novelty song could have been good, but the inebriated, coked-up Peckinpah doesn't come close, delivering an incomprensible, inexplicably self-important mess. To be sure, it has significant camp value, but from the director who gave us The Wild Bunch and Straw Dogs it's a complete head-scratcher. That it was Peckinpah's highest-grossing film shows there is no sanity in the movie world.

Jesus, how to describe the plot? Trucker Rubber Duck (Kris Kristofferson) and his friends Pig Pen (Burt Young) and Spider Mike (Franklyn Ajaye) get into a scrap with crooked cop Dirty Lyle (Ernest Borgnine) and flee, taking troublemaker Melissa (Ali McGraw) along for the ride. This results in a spontaneous, mile-long convoy of truckers. The media and the Governor of New Mexico (Seymour Cassels) mistake this for some sort of political protest, and the Duck is bewildered by his fame. When Spider Mike is laid low by some racist cops, Duck and his boys break him out of the jail, leading to a showdown with Dirty Lyle and the National Guard.

Convoy is just an inexplicable mess. The early truck stop brawl pretty much encapsulates the film: its use of slow-motion, rapid cutting, splattering red fluids (here, ketchup) and children cheering on the violence seems like a bad self-parody. Indeed, slow-motion is employed throughout, the cast bristles with Peckinpah veterans, and a truckload of "Jesus freaks" sings Shall We Gather at the River?, pathetically reminding us of Peckinpah's better work. Peckinpah himself even has a bizarre cameo. It seems like Bloody Sam is apologizing for the film he's making, and his attempts to inject social commentary and Christ allegories into the mix only add insult to injury.

The movie is unfocused and rambling, its pathetic "plot" just an excuse to get a crapload of big rigs on the road. The dialogue is hilariously bad, and I'm not surprised to learn much of it was ad-libbed. If you can't laugh at lines like "I am Officer Bookman, and I hate truckers!" and "Piss on you, and piss on your law!", you're dead inside. The film espouses a childish anarchism which makes no sense: the solution to the world's problems is to get in a truck, drive, and smash things. That's not a worldview, that's a temper tantrum. The half-assed social commentary - the racism directed at Spider Mike, the opportunistic Governor - are really misplaced. The hectoring lyrics of the titular song serve as an obnoxious narration that further sours the deal.

Peckinpah was stoned out of his gourd, and not really interested in the material anyway, leaving it to his second-unit directors. To be absolutely fair, there are some cool images throughout the film, especially the opening shots of Rubber Duck's rig driving through a wind-swept desert landscape. There are some well-staged stunts, particularly Dirty Lyle's car shearing the rooftop of a barn, but the endless shots of trucks on the move gets tiresome fast. Really, unless you have a hard-on for car crashes and big rigs, there's not enough substance to keep a person interested.

Kris Kristofferson (Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid) is a monotone, gravel-voiced parody of machismo, and an unusually-ugly Ali McGraw (The Getaway) again shows her complete lack of talent. Having trimmed her hair and scorched her flesh in a microwave, she's removed her only excuse for walking in front of a movie camera. These two have as much chemistry as a 5th grade science class, and as we have many long scenes in the truck with them, that's a pretty big drawback.

The supporting cast is equally out of sorts. Ernest Borgnine chews scenery with relish, and his delightfully hammy performance is the one bright spot. He, at least, knows what kind of film it is. Burt Young (The Killer Elite), Franklyn Ajaye (The 'burbs) and Madge Sinclair (Coming to America) give half-assed serious performances, and Seymour Cassel's (The Royal Tennenbaums) obnoxious politco is tacked on.

If there's anything good to say about Convoy, it's the camp value, and it's less painful to sit through than The Killer Elite, who only had random ninjas to redeem it. Still, aside from some cool crashes and kitsch, it's pretty much a waste of time.