The Marginally More Magnificent Seven

Early last year, I watched the recent remake of the classic film The Magnificent Seven, and was generally underwhelmed. Now I've found time for the 1960 original. (Well, not quite "original." For that, I'd have to see Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. Someday.)

As is often the case in watching films from earlier eras, the pace and narrative style of this movie are radically different from today, and a bit harder to get into. It's at times a painfully languid film, feeling every minute of its just-over-two-hours duration. On the other hand, it does care more about its characters than the typical film of this era, and often this is the reason the narrative slows. Throwing focus onto one of the film's seven heroes isn't a bad thing.

Another perk of watching these classic films is that you get to track the ancestry of modern movie cliches. Watching a movie like this is like going to the source, rather than watching a copy of a copy of a copy. The movie was engaging on that intellectual level, as moments would pop up and I'd wonder if this was where a particular trope began.

In the story, each member of the team is given a specific introductory scene, some of them quite elaborate. It's very well cast, with each of the actors lining up well to their character. Yul Brynner is a solid leader, inspirational and moral to a fault -- a sort of Jean-Luc Picard in an age that was more likely to portray a James T. Kirk. James Coburn also stands out, though perhaps more for the writing of the character than the performance, as his knife expert Britt gets a showy entrance.

The performer making the biggest meal of his role is Horst Buchholz as Chico, the young hothead with more rage than sense. In a way, he stood out to me for not being as famous (or going on to be as famous) as most of this cast... though also for not tamping down emotion behind the typical cool and collected facade of a Western hero. Reading about the actor after I finished the movie was interesting too; around this time, he was known as "the German James Dean," and probably would have broken big but for poor role selection. (Filming conflicts with far lesser known things kept him from taking parts in West Side Story and Lawrence of Arabia.)

The biggest star of the film may well be the musical score, composed by Elmer Bernstein. It's one of the most famous Western scores in cinema, with a main theme that you've very likely heard even if you don't know it comes from here. The music was actually the thumb on the scales that pushed me to watch the movie, as one of my favorite podcasts will be talking soon about this score. While I'm not quite sure it would make my own personal list of best movie scores, it certainly deserves its place in history, and I think holds up fairly well today.


For its good points, though, I found myself impatient at times watching this movie. I liked it better than the comparatively soulless remake, but I still don't think I'd recommend it to someone who isn't a fan of classic films. (It doesn't hold up nearly as well as, say, another 1960 film: Psycho.) I'd give The Magnificent Seven a C+. If you're a fan of Westerns or classic films -- that is, if it's the sort of movie for you -- chances are you've probably already seen it.