The Magnificent Seven (1960)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

John Sturges

Writer:

William Roberts (screenplay)

Release Date:

23 October 1960 (USA)

Genre:

Western | Adventure | Drama

Tagline:

They were seven - And they fought like seven hundred!

Plot:

An oppressed Mexican peasant village assembles seven gunfighters to help defend their homes.

Plot Keywords:

Village | Bandit | Showdown | Farmer | Peasant

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 1 win & 2 nominations

Cast

Yul Brynner	...	Chris Adams
Eli Wallach	...	Calvera
Steve McQueen	...	Vin
Charles Bronson	...	Bernardo O'Reilly
Robert Vaughn	...	Lee
Brad Dexter	...	Harry Luck
James Coburn	...	Britt
Horst Buchholz	...	Chico
Jorge Martínez de Hoyos	...	Hilario (as Jorge Martinez de Hoyas)
Vladimir Sokoloff	...	Old man
Rosenda Monteros	...	Petra
Rico Alaniz	...	Sotero
Pepe Hern
Natividad Vacío	...	Miguel (as Natividad Vacio)
Mario Navarro	...	Boy with O'Reilly

Also Known As:

Les sept mercenaires (Belgium: French title) (Canada: French title) (France) [fr]
Die glorreichen Sieben (Austria) (West Germany) [de]
Los siete magníficos (Argentina) (Spain) [es]
Siete hombres y un destino (Chile) (Mexico) [es]
7 rohkeata miestä (Finland) [fi]
7 vågade livet (Sweden) [sv]
A hét mesterlövész (Hungary) [hu]
I magnifici sette (Italy) [it]
Kai oi 7 isan yperohoi (Greece) [el]
Kai oi 7 itan yperohoi (Greece) (reissue title) [el]
Koya no shichinin (Japan) [ja]
Os sete Magníficos (Portugal) [pt]
Sedam velicanstvenih (Serbia) [sr]
Sedm statecnych (Czechoslovakia) [cs]
Seitsemän rohkeata miestä (Finland) [fi]
Sete Homens E um Destino (Brazil) [pt]
Siedmiu wspanialych (Poland) [pl]
Syv mænd sejrer (Denmark) [da]
Yedi silahsörler (Turkey: Turkish title) [tr]

Runtime:

128 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Spanish

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

Canada:PG (Manitoba/Ontario) | Canada:G (Nova Scotia/Quebec) | Australia:PG | Australia:PG (TV rating) (2005) | Netherlands:6 (DVD rating) | USA:Approved (certificate #19668) | West Germany:12 (f) | Brazil:12 | Argentina:13 | Australia:M (TV rating) | Finland:K-16 | Norway:16 | Sweden:15 | UK:PG

Filming Locations:

Churubusco Studios, Mexico City, Distrito Federal, Mexico

Company:

Mirisch Corporation, The

Trivia:

James Coburn (Britt) and Robert Vaughn (Lee) have only 11 and 16 lines in the entire film respectively. Although they were close friends for almost 50 years, this is their only film together.

Goofs:

Continuity: The first man Calvera kills near the beginning of the movie has no wounds on his back after being shot and falling to the ground. When the villagers run to the body to look at the man, there are two wounds on his back.

Quotes:

[Chris and Vin enter thier room, to see Lee sitting there, waiting]
Lee: Remember me?
Chris Adams: Yup.
Lee: You need men for a job in Mexico? How long?
Chris Adams: Four, maybe six weeks.
Lee: That ought to do it. How much does the job pay?
Chris Adams: I thought you were looking for the Johnson brothers, Lee.
Lee: [smirking] I found them. Now, how much does the job pay?
Chris Adams: Twenty dollars.
Lee: I'll have the money before I leave. It should just take care of my last two days' rent.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Team Knight Rider: The Magnificent T.K.R. (#1.2)" (1997)

About as good as remakes get

I recently subjected "The Magnificent Seven" to just about the toughest test imaginable--I watched it just a few days after "Seven Samurai." And while I'm not going to pretend it's on par with Kurosawa's astounding masterpiece, I have to tip my hat to Hollywood on this one: it's good, DAMN good, among the best American Westerns.

The focus of the screenplay is more on post-Bogart-pre-Eastwood cool banter than the gradual, taciturn character development of "Seven Samurai," but that doesn't mean that the film doesn't have a heart. Considering it clocks in at barely over two hours (compared to the marathonic three and a half of "Samurai"), it actually does a fantastic and very economical job of fleshing out its memorable cast of characters.

One particularly wonderful scene that stuck in my memory from the first time I saw the film ten years ago is the one where Lee (Robert Vaughn), drunk in the middle of the night, confesses his frailties and fear to two of the farmers. The scene (along with the general story of these down-and-out heroes) was groundbreaking in that it began the deconstruction and deromanticization of the Western hero which would be brought to fruition in Sergio Leone's unparalleled spaghetti Westerns.

The star-studded cast wouldn't hold up doing Shakespeare, but they're ideal in this gunslinging, cool-talking tough-guy adventure. As if a lineup of heroes that included Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, and James Coburn wasn't enough, Eli Wallach steals the show as the Mexican bandit chief, a worthy precursor to his classic role "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly." If the screenplay has a major flaw, it's that his character isn't featured more.

The score is, of course, one of the all-time classics. And while not as alive visually as the Japanese film that inspired it or the Italian Westerns it influenced, it's still mighty fine to look at, and the gunfights don't disappoint.

The pieces add up to one of the great entertaining films of all time, which still manages to be moving and morally aware despite its Hollywoodization of Kurosawa's vision.