NOT QUITE MAGNIFICENT
Reboot of western falls short
Back in the analog age, the more you copied something, the worse it got. (Remember Michael Keaton in Multiplicity?) Something of that rule still seems to hold with the newest remake of The Magnificent Seven, which might better be called The Magnificent Two and the So-So Five.
The 1954 original, Seven Samurai by Akira Kurosawa, was remade in 1960 by John Sturges with improvements (to western sensibilities) that included colour film, U.S. dialogue and Yul Brynner. (Though some have argued those last two cancel each other out.)
Antoine Fuqua is the director of the new film. He knows a thing or two about remakes, having taken on King Arthur (2004) and The Equalizer (2014). His Seven includes a more diverse cast, headed up by Denzel Washington, and including Korea’s Byunghun Lee, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo of Mexico, and Native American actor Martin Sensmeier.
Alas, those last three cowpokes are part of the so-so sub-group, alongside Vincent D’Onofrio as a hirsute mountain man and Ethan Hawke, a Civil War veteran with the almost Bond-girl name of Goodnight Robicheaux. It’s not the actors’ fault, however: they do their best with what they’re given. But it’s not an equalopportunity screenplay.
The bones of the story are the same as in earlier incarnations. It’s 1879, and a peaceful town is being menaced, in this case by an evil land baron played with simmering, satanic glee by Peter Sarsgaard.
After losing her husband in defence of the town, Emma Cullen (Haley Bennett) goes looking for someone to help. “I seek righteousness,” she tells the stoic Sam Chisolm (Washington). “But I’ll take revenge.”
With these fightin’ words, Chisolm agrees to help, and starts rounding up a posse. Funniest of the bunch (onscreen and off ) is Chris Pratt as Josh Faraday, a gambler and con man. He and Chisolm also have the best onscreen chemistry, although an apparent desire to maintain a cold demeanour works against them all.
Witty crosstalk should be one of the pleasures to be had in a men-on-a-mission movie like this one, but there’s not enough of it.
Characters mosey about and sometimes drink to excess, but seldom to any great comic effect. Washington does get to toss out the phrase “yellow-bellied sapsucking coward,” which should please the ornithologists in the crowd.
The other cinematic catharsis should come from the climactic battle scene. The Magnificent Seven has two, separated by the ominous phrase “what happened here was just an opening skirmish.” But both are so choppily shot and edited that it’s sometimes hard to tell where everyone is, or how the good guys manage to discern who’s evil in the splitsecond it takes to draw and fire. I think they’re just magnificently lucky.
Credit to Fuqua for keeping digital effects to a minimum; for allowing Sensmeier’s character, Red Harvest, to realistically run out of arrows at a critical juncture; and for reminding us the only reason they built second storeys in the Old West was so people could fall dramatically off them when shot.
But these aren’t enough riches to pay off the investment of going to see The Magnificent Seven. Neither is getting to hear the final soundtrack work of James Horner, who died before he could finish.
When he brings in the unforgettable music from the 1960 film, it just reminds us of what else we’re missing here.