Box Office Bomb: Budget: $21-22 million. Box-Office: $5.9 million (domestic). $9 million (worldwide). It was a remake of the French classic The Wages of Fear and was even marketed under this title in Europe. This drove many people away from the film because they believed it was sacrilege to remake a classic. Meanwhile in English-speaking countries people were confused by the title. Sorcerer, what does it mean? Is it a supernatural movie (like Friedkin's The Exorcist)? Is it a fantasy movie? Only people who have seen the movie know that is the name of one of the trucks hauling the dynamite. Add that the first 15 minutes are in foreign language (there were reports on walkouts by those without patience for subtitles) and a little movie that came out a month prior called Star Wars (in fact Sorcerer took its place at the Chinese Theater... who soon brought Star Wars back), and Sorcerer became a hard sell in a tough market.
The Character Died with Him: Averted. While Karl John did pass away in 1977, his "Marquez" was always written as being killed by Nilo and his parts were filmed year prior to his death. But it still became an urban legend how there was a need for quick reshoots and changes in the plot, all due to the legendary status of the Troubled Production the movie had.
Cast the Expert: The Israeli soldiers in the Jerusalem sequence were real IDF personnel. William Friedkin simply directed them to act as they normally would in that situation, and filmed the results.
Deleted Scene: Several that turn up in other edits of the film from European edits of the film:
A deleted sequence that involved a "washboard" road (a road that has a series of ruts that would cause the vehicle to shake). Nilo is driving when they encounter the washboard, with him refusing to speed up when Scanlon tells him to. This causes Scanlon to jump to Nilo's side and force the truck up to speed up to 40 miles per hour to cut down on the shake. The scene is like the one in the first film adaptation of The Wages of Fear and a brief clip can be seen during Scalon's hallucination when Nilo dies.
One deleted scene shows Lazaro pulling up to a deep puddle of water. Scanlan has Nilo get out of the truck to find out how deep it is. This is like the scene previous adaptation with the oil puddle, except no hidden tree limb is in the water. Nilo also doesn't get injured like his previous adaptation's counterpart.
One deleted scene includes an explanation on why the company had to use old stock of dynamite. The terrorists that blew up the drilling platform are the same men who try to steal Lazaro towards the end of the film. They broke in and cleared out their entire fresh stock of explosives.
An alternate version of the scene of Scanlon at the cafe at the end of the film includes brief clips of the explosives blowing out the fire at the destroyed platform.
An extended version of the trucks start of the journey. Surrano walks up to Sorcerer and wishes Scanlon luck. Scanlon replying, "See you in hell, Surrano." There's cut dialogue from the scene where Scanlon and Nilo come across Sorcerer's wreckage that features a call back to this scene.
There's also an additional scene that has Scanlon asking Nilo about why he killed Marquez that extends the scene at the start of the journey with the two in Lazaro:
Nilo: I flipped a coin. Scanlon: And Marquez lost, eh? Nilo: No. You did. But I'm partial to Americans.
Executive Meddling: The film's European distributor released a radically altered cut called Wages of Fear to remind audiences about the source material. It was roughly a half-hour shorter than Friedkin's cut and rearranged the prologue to appear as flashbacks within the main story. Friedkin was not amused.
Fake Nationality: Nilo (Mexican) is played by Francisco Rabal (Spanish). The Palestinian Kasseem is played French-Moroccan actor Amidou.
Keep Circulating the Tapes: The film was unavailable on VHS until 1990, the fullscreen DVD issue was a very rare item, and repertory theaters had a hard time booking this movie, all because there was a rights issue with the film. Paramount and Universal sold their rights to the film to their foreign distribution joint venture, CIC, which disbanded and their records became missing. Friedkin sued both studios in 2012 to determine those rights. The lawsuit was resolved and Sorcerer was re-released by Warner Bros. in 2013.
The episode "The Believer" in Star Wars: The Mandaloriannote from the breakout franchise that ruined this film's box office chances... references the "transport of dangerous explosives through a jungle" plotline as the main character needs to access an Imperial station to locate the kidnapped Child.
Release Date Change: The original release date was set for late 1976, but due to Troubled Production, it was pushed for June 1977, ending up in theatres right when A New Hope craze picked up speed. While it's unlikely the movie would be a big success, at least it wouldn't have to battle with the juggernaut that Star Wars turned out to be when released in the original schelude.
Star-Making Role: While the movie tanked and killed Friedkin's career, it still put Tangerine Dream on the map for film industry, making them one of the most popular composers for the movies in The '80s.
Troubled Production: It was supposed to be a "little 2.5 million in-between movie" by William Friedkin, particularly as he had just went through Hell with The Exorcist. But it turned out to be a $22 million antipode experience to Apocalypse Now (as it was primarily shot in Latin America, across the world from Coppola's Southeast Asia misadventures), with actors refusing the movie even when they liked the script due to having to travel to Ecuador and Dominican Republic, sick crewmembers (including Friedkin himself), difficult stunts and effects, and Friedkin's Prima Donna Director tendencies leading to plenty of dismissals. Even the weather was uncooperative, to the point of the river needed for the bridge scene drying out in the first ever recorded drought in that area - but only after the expensive set of the bridge was built (this happened twice with two different rivers). And then the film did not perform well upon release - reviews were mixed, and audiences that weren't alienated by the Non-Indicative Title and the subtitles were more interested in Star Wars.
Friedkin initially contacted Peter Gabriel about collaboration during the already troubled sessions for The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. While this ultimately went nowhere, it saw the beginning of the end for Gabriel's involvement with Genesis.
Working Title: Ballbreaker, which would easily solve half of the confusion about the final title and speculations about being connected to The Exorcist.
for his "The Pop of King" column in Entertainment Weekly in August 2009.