Convoy - Trincea d'asfalto

Truckers form a mile long "convoy" in support of a trucker's vendetta with an abusive sheriff (Ernest Borgnine and his amazing facial hair)... Based on the country song of same title by C. W. McCall.

While the film will obviously be compared to "Smokey and the Bandit" (both featuring semi trailers being hounded by a sheriff), let it be known that they are not at odds and actually complement each other well (a good double feature, perhaps).

Is Kris Kristopherson the same as Burt Reynolds? No. Is Ernest Borgnine the same as Jackie Gleason? Of course not. So it is sort of like the same story told in two different worlds. This one is a bit lighter on the comedy and much lighter on the romance.

A convoy of angry and enraged truckers are rolling down the desert highways of Arizona New Mexico and Texas led by Martin Penwald (Kris Kistofferson) using the CB-handle "Rubber Duck". The truckers had enough of the corrupt highway cops who shake them down and threaten to impound their rigs. Leaving the truckers without any means of financial support. As well as the ridicules 55 MPH speed limit on the highways that cuts into their time and earnings and last but not least the sky-rocketing gas prices.

After the Rubber Duck and two of his trucker pals Love Machine & Spider Mike,Burt Young & Franklyn Ajaye, were entrapped by the nasty and vindictive local Sheriff Lyle Wallace, Earnest Borgnine,for illegally using the trucker CB-handle name Cottonmouth. Their shaken down by the "lawman" for $70.00 each in order to avoid having their trucks impounded and them being thrown behind bars.

The three later Going to the local truck stop to celebrate the Rubber Ducks birthday and have a few drinks are again confronted by the lawman. Sheriff Wallace, still not satisfied with pushing the truckers around, comes snooping around the area to make a few more bucks off the abused haulers. Wallace picks on poor Spider Mike accusing him of loitering and is about to throw him in jail. Spiker Mike pleads to the unfeeling Wallace that his wife is about to give birth and to please leave him alone which doesn't move the sheriff at all. But a straight right to his jaw, by Spider Mike, does make him move right on the butt of his pants. In a bar brawl with the truckers, who come to the aid of Spider Mike Love Machine and the Rubber Duck, Wallace and two of his deputies are knocked out cold and handcuffed as the three truckers together with the Rubber Duck's new found squeeze the plucky and outspoken Melissa (Ali MacGraw), a wedding photographer who's car broke down, then take off and go back on the road again with the entire Arizona Highway Patrol on their tail.

Chased by the crazy Sheriff Wallace, who commandeered a car from a young couple smoking and shearing a joint. the Rubber Duck Love Machine & Spider Mike get the full support from some very expected and unexpected persons that during the remainder of the film has them on the front pages of the news as well as getting the ear of the local governors senators and even the President of the United States himself.

There's strength in numbers is the theme of "Convoy" with the Rubber Duck & friends making a private affair into a public happening. This by drawing attention to the plight of him and his fellow truckers and how their short-changed and ill-treated by everyone down the line, police politicians and big oil, as they try to do their.

The giant convoy of truckers following the Rubber Duck open the eyes of the nation and puts corrupt low-lives like Sheriff Wallace on the front pages. All that showed what these hard working and dedicated men, the truckers, have to put up with every day and night that their on the road. In the end they get the support and respect from the public, as well as the politicians, that they so richly deserve. When the clueless and almost brain-dead politicians see the endless line of the trucker convoy lead by the Rubber Duck they not only stand up and listen but they deliver as well.

One of director Sam Peckinpah's most underrated films that, as far as I could see, had no one killed in it. Even though the amount of violence and explosions were equaled to Peckinpah's famous blood-splattering 1969 classic "The Wild Bunch".

Convoy is the shallowest of Sam Peckinpah's films, but by no means the worst. It contains some oddball characters and a number of memorable sequences, and alternately funny and thought-provoking dialogue. It also features one of the very best Ernest Borgnine performances that I can remember - not bad for a man who won an Oscar for Marty!

The story traces the fortunes of some truckers, led by "Rubber Duck" (Kris Kristofferson), as they drive through the states of New Mexico, Texas and Arizona. They are pursued by the law, and gradually more and more truckers join on at the back of the line until they have literally hundreds of lorries, all roaring along the highways in protest of the prejudicial treatment they receive from the cops.

Kristofferson is supremely enigmatic as the leader of the pack. Ali MacGraw is a bit of a bore as his female companion. As mentioned before, the real star is Borgnine, mean and menacing, funny and cruel as the cop who dedicates his life to victimising truck drivers. For such a shallow film, it looks and sounds beautiful. Even the car chase through the sand is poetic. I can't explain what's good about this picture. It sounds dull and pointless, yet to watch it is a thoroughly enjoyable experience. Convoy is a contradiction of itself.... plotless, pointless, thinly plotted, and yet still (somehow) a top notch film!

I don't think this film is as bad as it's reputation suggests. I've seen a fair number of these kind of truckin'/car chase films from the late 70's, and I think it's a fairly average representation of the genre ... perhaps even a bit better than average given the presence of Kris Kristofferson, Ernest Borgnine and Burt Young. What's disappointing is that you expect Peckinpah to elevate anything he works on to something better than "average genre film" status, and he fails to do that. There are moments when you sense his presence ... a slow motion shot of big trucks hightailing it along a sandy back road achieves a certain poetic majesty ... but mostly you get the feeling that he simply didn't care about this film. It's a giant missed opportunity.

Sam Peckinpah's 'Convoy' works as, if nothing else, a little cultural/pop cultural archeology. Based on a novelty song that was itself a product of a short-lived CB (citizen's band) radio/trucker craze that swept the States in the mid 70s, it offers up a rather vivid slice of life from the days of malaise. It was one of several such films ('Smokey and the Bandit', 'Breaker! Breaker!', 'White Line Fever') trying to cash in, but this one is notable for the presence of Peckinpah behind the camera (though how much the struggling Peckinpah was actually behind said camera is apparently open to debate).

'Convoy' is a tough film to nail down. At times it veers into the dadgummit, cornpone comedy territory of Smokey and the Bandit, and at others it evokes a more traditional Peckinpah zeitgeist. Ironically, it probably works best when it straddles that line. At those times, 'Convoy' offers up a broadly entertaining action yarn, with colorful characters occupying simple, well defined turf. I wish Peckinpah and Co. had somehow been able to marry that more cohesively to his standard themes while leaving the broad yucks out of the equation.