As I sat watching this week’s remake of The Magnificent Seven one thing was glaringly apparent: Antoine Fuqua really wanted to make an old school western.
The Training Day director saturates his retelling with all of the clichés and tropes of the genre. There are plenty of panning shots across the vast plains, men thrown through windows (this happens more than once) and numerous close ups of manly men doing their best impersonation of Clint Eastwood straight out of Italy. Squinty eyes and all.
It is homage to the point of boredom but it begs the question: why didn’t he just make an “original” Western movie and be done with it? Why remake a classic that in turn was a remake itself? Or better yet, if you are going to take another stab at it, why not place it in another setting like the 1960 version did with the original Seven Samurai? That at least would make some artistic sense.
Mr. Fuqua, if you are going to stay with the textbook and re-present a hundred images we’ve seen a thousand times, just make your own movie. The retell here (as is the norm) is pointless.
That aside, there is some fun to be had with 2016’s The Magnificent Seven but most of that enjoyment comes from a likable cast. Chris Pratt is always welcome and he brings a much needed levity and charm to the film. Denzel Washington doesn’t stretch much either but is always able to lead a film. Ethan Hawke chews it up and overacts marvelously. Poor Haley Bennett, who has a strong presence on film and holds her own in a film filled with masculinity, isn’t given much to do.
Quick observation regarding Mr. Fuqua and women. He doesn’t know what to do with them. He made a terrible film back in 2009 called Brooklyn’s Finest. I don’t see all of his films, not the biggest fan, but that one I caught. The story consisted of a bunch of macho men doing and saying macho things while every woman in the film was either a hooker, a stripper or a victim. Ridiculous.
And here with The Magnificent Seven, aside from our assertive “damsel in distress” Miss Bennett, all the women in the saloon strutting their waggly bits. Prostitutes. Way too many prostitutes. It’s pathetic.
Anyways. Despite a solid cast, there isn’t much here. Just another retread that doesn’t even have the inspiration to deviate in the slightest from what we’ve seen before.
