Director:Sam Peckinpah
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While driving through the Arizona desert, Albuquerque based independent trucker Martin Penwald - who goes by the handle "Rubber Duck" - along with his fellow truckers "Pig Pen" and "Spider Mike", are entrapped by unscrupulous Sheriff Lyle "Cottonmouth" Wallace using a key tool of the trucker's trade, the citizens' band (CB) radio. Rubber Duck and Cottonmouth have a long, antagonistic history. When this encounter later escalates into a more physical one as Cottonmouth threatens Spider Mike, a man who just wants to get home to his pregnant wife, Rubber Duck and other the truckers involved, including Spider Mike, Pig Pen and "Widow Woman", go on the run, figuring the best thing to do being to head to New Mexico to avoid prosecution. Along for the ride is Melissa, a beautiful photographer who just wanted a ride to the airport. As news of what happened spreads over the CB airwaves... Martin "Rubber Duck" Penwald (Kristofferson) is driving through the desert in Arizona, when a woman in a Jaguar passes by. They're driving side by side for a while when a sheriff's deputy pulls over Rubber Duck, who in turn sets the deputy upon the woman who was "enticing him".
Truck Driver
Proceeding on his way, Rubber Duck runs into two friends (and fellow truck drivers) Pig Pen Burt Young and Spider Mike,when another "trucker" informs them over the C.B. that the road up ahead is "all clean and green" and they are okay to increase their speed. The "trucker" also insults Pig Pen (Love Machine) by calling his Mack truck a "pussy." As they come around a sharp turn at 75 mph, they are caught by the "trucker," corrupt Sheriff "Dirty Lyle" Wallace (Borgnine).
After being extorted by Lyle for $50 dollars each and eventually $70 when both Pig Pen and Mike insult Wallace, the Duck informs Wallace that The Teamsters are organizing the cops to which Lyle responds that he wants no part of the Duck's damn union. The Duck reminds Wallace that he is independent and Lyle comments that they have that in common to which The Duck answers back that there also not many of them (Duck and Wallace) left. Duck, Pig Pen and Mike leave and head on to Rafael's Glide-In where The Duck's sometime girlfriend, Violet works as a waitress.
Also there is Melissa, the driver of the Jaguar. Her car had broken down and is there for repairs and she is selling Widow Woman some of her things so she can have money to leave Arizona. The Duck arrives and reunites with Violet and meets Melissa face to face, Melissa informs Violet that she knows The Duck because he was the one who told the cop she was nude driving. The Duck asks Melissa if she has ever ridden in a truck and she says no, but is intrigued by him and might take him on his offer to ride in his truck. Violet then ushers him away to give him a special birthday present. While away Wallace shows up at the Glide-In checking plates. Pig Pen and Spider Mike start making fun of Wallace as he drives around the truck stop, but when the waitress makes some noise in the background collecting dirty plates, Wallace finds where they are and enters the diner and asks Pig Pen how much money he has and he shows Wallace his roll of bills. When Spider Mike informs Wallace that he has no money, Wallace attempts to arrest him.
After Thoughts:
Convoy was filmed almost entirely in the state of New Mexico. Production began in 1977 when the CB Raido/trucking craze was at its peak, inspiring such films as Smoky and the bandit (1977),Handle with care(1977), Breaker! Breaker! (1977) and High-Ballin' (1978), as well as the television series Moven`on (1974-1976) and B.J. and the bear (1979–1981).The picture finished 11 days behind schedule at a cost of $12 million, more than double its original budget. Surprisingly, Convoy was the highest-grossing picture of Peckinpah's career, notching $46.5 million at the box office. But his reputation was seriously damaged by rumors of increasingly destructive alcohol and cocaine abuse. Peckinpah would make just one more film The osterman weekend in 1983, before his death the following year.The famous scene where the tanker truck goes off a bridge and explodes was filmed in Needles,California on a one-way bridge over the Colorado River between Arizona and Needles. The Needles City Fire Department provided fire protection during this scene. The bridge was soon thereafter removed as a new span connected the two sides of the river.
I give this movie a (B+)
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