Off the deep end ... Sam Peckinpah

Okay, it's probably true that Sam went off the deep end when he made this movie. The story doesn't make a lot of sense in its later part, and there are many bits throughout that are admittedly bizarre. But when I watched the DVD the other night, seeing it again for the first time since it was released, the movie astounded me. Drunk, crazy, off the deep end: no matter what state he was in, that man could direct action. CONVOY delivers the goods. Forget about the human characters, they don't really matter. The trucks, awesome and majestic, are the real stars here. Peckinpah obviously loves the way these giant machines move through space. At its best, when those trucks kick it and run, the movie feels like one long Roadrunner cartoon played by dinosaurs. Each chase sequence is different and the action we follow is intensified by the very fact that we're watching trucks maneuver and out maneuver automobiles! These action scenes quite simply make you want to shout and cheer and cuss and ... well, go off the deep end - in your own living room! Sam, I think, didn't actually work with the editor on this one. By the time the film was in post he had been fired - I think .. But the footage, the coverage was there. Those scenes were shot with the same fluid grace that one associates with Peckinpah at his best. Not only that, but in a Peckinpah film, when it all gets going, the action speeds up but not so fast that we can't follow what's going on; we remain connected to it because the moment to moment actions tell a rapid story we can follow and understand . Compared to the rapid cutting and computer generated jolts that proliferate today's action movies, Sam's drunken cartoon comes off as being fresh, exciting, and vital. Okay, perhaps I'm going a bit overboard here; this is not one of Sam's brilliant movies, and when the trucks stop chasing the human stories are all but inconsequential. But the action IS BRILLIANT, and the movie still rocks with an unmistakable sense of joy.