Stephen King recently shared his ten all-time favorite films, explicitly excluding any adaptations of his own novels. He even calls out Misery and The Shawshank Redemption as examples of titles he wouldn’t include.
The lineup favors enduring classics, including Casablanca, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Double Indemnity, The Godfather Part II, and Jaws. He also praises Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets, a choice that reflects his penchant for grounded, character-driven stories. A second Spielberg pick, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, sits alongside his nod to Groundhog Day, which stands as his sole entry in the comedy camp.
The list closes with two hard-edged thrillers: Sam Peckinpah’s The Getaway and William Friedkin’s Sorcerer, with Sorcerer taking the top spot. King has long admired the director’s tight, suspenseful approach to cinema.
Sorcerer: from misfire to enduring thriller
Friedkin entered a peak run in the 1970s after The French Connection and The Exorcist, yet Sorcerer would become a box-office disappointment. Released in a summer crowded by Star Wars, the film struggled to find an audience, and the high-profile casting switch—from Steve McQueen to Roy Scheider—didn’t help expectations. The title’s ambiguity also muddied viewers’ assumptions, making the film appear supernatural when it wasn’t.
Today, Sorcerer is recognized as a lean, white-knuckle thriller. It showcases Friedkin’s signature realism, following four men as they push detonating charges across dangerous terrain in a desperate trek to avert an oil well disaster. The film culminates in a nerve-wracking bridge crossing, a sequence built on sound, atmosphere, and formidable momentum. Friedkin’s hands-on method—shooting with real trucks in real jungles and even stepping into the water himself—cements Sorcerer’s status among the great thrillers.
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