The
Magnificent Seven
Sam Chisolm: "A man carries
a gun, he tends to use it."
The
Magnificent Seven is directed by Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, The Equalizer,
Shooter) and stars Denzel Washington
as Sam Chisolm, Chris Pratt as Josh Faraday, Ethan Hawke as Goodnight Robicheaux,
Vincent D'Onofrio as Jack Horne, Byung-hun Lee as Billy Rocks, Manuel
Garcia-Rulfo as Vasquez, Martin Sensmeier as Red Harvest, Peter Sarsgaard as Bartholomew
Bogue, and Haley Bennett as Emma Cullen.
In this Western remake of the American
version of Seven Samurai, despicable
and infamous outlaw Bartholomew Bogue has taken over the small mining town of
Rose Creek. By doing so, he killed a handful of people, one of them being Emma
Cullen's husband. Out for the blood of her husband's killer, Emma hires bounty
hunter Sam Chisolm to round up a bunch of other dangerous anti-heroes to kill
Bogue, his army of outlaws, and save Rose Creek and its residents from being
destroyed.
Welcome back, western films! Although The Magnificent Seven is more flaunting
in its aesthetics than its details in character arcs, there isn't a doubt in my
mind that I had a good amount of fun throughout the movie, especially in the
last battle sequence. That s**t blew my mind and if I were really there, it would've
blown me up (ha!). This movie knows it isn't out to be a classic. If you saw
the trailers for it, then you know as well that it wasn't going to be Oscar
contending (most likely). There is no problem whatsoever with that though. It's
awesome to watch the really exciting standoffs that The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly has made so popular. The homage to
those Mexican standoffs are really well shot thanks to director Antoine Fuqua's
direction. His keen eye for action is what has made him so popular in recent
years with movies like The Equalizer,
Olympus Has Fallen, and Shooter. With that, I really want to say
that The Magnificent Seven is
probably one of the most violent PG-13 movies I have seen in recent memory. I
could totally imagine this movie being rated R, which is what I was hoping for
because when I did see the trailer and how much action was going to be involved
in the film's battle sequences, I didn't think that a PG-13 rating would fit
well with what the filmmakers set out to do. Nevertheless, it worked, but if
there is a director's cut with more violence, you can bet your ass I'll be
watching that! The problem with movies that use action to lure fans is that
there is a good chance that the editing will be incredibly choppy (i.e. almost
everything Michael Bay does). Thankfully, the editing department worked hard on
this film. They made the explosions and gun fights as smooth as possible so the
audience wouldn't have an inducing headache. To be honest, in the first 10
minutes, I was counting how many shots were fired just for fun...yeah, I lost
track after that. I bet you anything, there was probably a trailer on set just
to store the amount of blanks used.
It isn't fair of me to s**t on a movie that
knew it wasn't going to aim for much, but it's what I'm going to do anyways
because it is a movie. Despite the main attention getter being the action, The Magnificent Seven doesn't allow for
much character information. There are plenty of films that are predominately
action oriented PLUS add the benefits of fleshed out characters. The two
characters that I felt got some sort of background in The Magnificent Seven were Sam Chisolm and Goodnight Robicheaux. Sam
Chisolm's background is more or less revealed to the end when you find out that
it's a personal matter to kill Bogue and Robicheaux's background is there to
just add some flare at the end. I honestly believe that if the actors
portraying these characters were casted differently, I would have no interest
at all in The Magnificent Seven.
Luckily, Denzel Washington is an amazing actor and he carries the film well
with a fantastic supporting cast. Chris Pratt is basically Chris Pratt from his
other movies: charming, funny, and modern. I had a hard time staying in the
mindset of being in the wild west in the 1800's because many of Chris Pratt's,
and others', moments felt out of place of how someone would act back then. Then
again, the actors are all so great at what they do that I didn't even care by
the end. Fleshed out characters would have been nice, but considering that this
movie is already at a long-as-hell 133 minutes, I would've preferred fun action
over a longer running time. In retrospect, the filmmakers really could've cut
like 20 minutes or so out. I checked my watch pretty confused on how long the
set up would be for this big battle at the end.
These guys are just so likable that I can't hate on whatever they do.
I'll keep this specific review short,
sweet, and to the point. The Magnificent
Seven is by no means a perfect movie, however it sets out to render an
action packed and lively feel. It achieves just that along with good acting,
which I would expect from this cast. Thanks to director Antoine Fuqua, the well
thought out violence (and there's a lot of it) gave me, specifically, an experience
that is harmless and quite fun. I can definitely recommend seeing The Magnificent Seven. I don't think
it'll be on anyone's radar to see in about 4 weeks or so, but it'd be cool to
see on the big screen, especially for those gunshot sounds and the flashy battles.
There isn't anything new, but it knows that. The Magnificent Seven is magnificent for what I expected it to be:
a fun, popcorn stuffing, action movie.
3.9/5
PRO
- Fun action
- Antoine Fuqua's direction
- Acting chops from the cast
CON
- No character backgrounds; not as attached to the characters
- Running time is longer than what it should be
The Magnificent Seven
is rated PG-13 for extended and intense sequences of Western violence, and for
historical smoking, some language and suggestive material
Click here to watch the
trailer
The Magnificent Seven
is in theaters now
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