What a beautiful movie!

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

This is, of course, is an Americanized version of "The Seven Samurai" from Japan. Yul Brynner is a gunfighter looking for work who encounters a pair of poor Mexican farmers who have had their village attacked and pillaged by a bad guy played by Eli Wallach. In a strange bit of casting, the native New Yorker is the Mexican bandit. Brynner gathers a crew including Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Steve McQueen and Robert Vaughn to help him in his quest to defend the village. The scenery of Mexico is beautiful and the cast is excellent. The remake stars Denzel Washington as the leader and the story is moved to the United States. I prefer the clearer story in the original version, although both are very good movies. I write this in 2017 and all the stars are now dead. I watched the new version first and the 1960 version a day later. I can highly recommend both.

Reviewed August 2010It did not pan out as how I expected it to be, rather was more entertaining. It follows a linear and typical western narrative about a bunch of peasants hiring a few guns to get rid of a bandit Calvera and his gang who thrive on the village for free supplies. The lead characters in Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen and an ensemble of others are cast perfectly and each evokes a style that is subtle in presentation but looks very intentional in the viewers perspective. As it moves briskly on familiar ground for most of it's runtime, the twist in strategy by Calvera towards the end was very fresh and took me by surprise. It features very good action sequences for it's time and as an example I can think of one stunt where Chico pulls off a bandit from the horse and gets on the same horse during it's fall and rise. There was also effective use of dust to conclude most action scenes like falling off, a shot towards the camera or skidding to take cover etc. It's stylish, has an entertaining plot that features an interesting bad guy, though gets a bit melodramatic at times doesn't drag too long.

When I grew up it was sci-fi that took hold, with the advent of Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, etc. and new, good westerns were few and far between. However, this was a western that slipped through the filter and struck me as such a good movie. Excellent acting from an all-star cast, an iconic score and archetypal script all contributed to being wonderful entertainment as well as a top-notch production.Having seen literally over a thousand movies, one of the highest praises I can give is to say I still vividly remember scenes decades later. The Magnificent Seven has quite a few scenes that fall under that category.

The Magnificent Seven is a 1960's western directed by John Sturges. It's a movie that I had heard of but knew little about before watching, and left me with mixed feelings. There are things that work, and the acting is (mostly) strong, but ultimately the film is dragged down by an agonisingly slow pace. This is 128 minute film which would probably work better if it were half that length. It takes the first 45 minutes before they have even recruited the seven (in a very Avengers Assemble-type-way), and then they go to protect a villain from plundering bandits. The issue is that the plot doesn't really develop from there. Director John Sturges focuses entirely on characterisation instead of genuine story development, so the end result is a film with great characters but a story that drags on and on, which passed its sell-by-date within the first hour. However the plus-side to this is that the film contains some genuinely good characters, who mostly manage to keep it entertaining, even when the pace drags it down. Yul Brynner as Chris Larabee Adams and the great Steve McQueen as Vin Tanner both offer great performances and characters - it is these two that keep the film afloat. The villain of the story, Calvera, played by Eli Wallach is somewhat average but at the same time the exact type of villain you would expect from this type of film, so in that way he serves his purpose. The casting is on- point and there are only a couple of weak performances, so on the whole there are few complaints there. Being a western about 1870's gunslingers and bandits, an audience would naturally assume that this would be a movie packed with action, but unfortunately this is no where near the case. There is virtually no trace of action within the first 70 minutes of the movie, and even after then, there are only two real shootouts, which, although they were well shot and entertaining in themselves, were far too infrequent. In a movie already dragged down by a very slow pace, a bit of action here and there would go a long way; but audiences are bound to be disappointed as they are instead forced to listen to endless monologues about not giving up and fighting to survive, yet ironically we barely see any of this. If you're looking for a movie that focuses mostly on characters instead of action or story, this will probably please you (although you'd be better off watching the 2015 Steve Jobs movie, which does a much better job of both characters and story), but if you're looking for an action-packed Western with a strong story, look away - you will not find that here. Still, the characters are certainly good, and the acting complements them, along with a great, Oscar-nominated soundtrack by Elmer Bernstein that all works together to make this a just-about-enjoyable movie that still, in 2016, has its strengths.