I need more of the theme song. Yes, to be sure: more theme song. Ignore the Kurosawa original. Don’t heed the Yul Brynner/Steve McQueen version. This whole Western story works so much better with that awesome Elmer Bernstein theme running throughout. So let me help you out for this review.
First the winds:
♪Duh duhduh duh duh duhduhduh duh
Duh duhduh duh duh duhduhduh duh♫
Now add the strings:
♪Mm-mmmmmmmm hm-hm-mm-eeeee
Mm-mmmmmmmm hm-hm-mm-ooooo
Hm-hm mm-ee hm-ee-ah-oooo
Hm-hm-ah-ee-ah-oo-mm♫
Look, one day, I’ll make this a multiple-media interaction. At that time, you might have to listen to me rant in person about Twilight, Tyler Perry and found footage camerawork. I don’t think you want that, so be thankful I’m only asking you to imagine the music from the 1960s Magnificent Seven.
The overwhelming feeling of this Magnificent Seven is something is missing. I started with the score because that’s the most obvious piece to me; far as I can tell, the original Bernstein theme plays only during the closing credits while you’re walking out, which is pathetic. And it’s not that the rest of the film is shoddy or poor, it’s just terribly underwhelming.
Blockbuster action films require great villainy. Hmmm, well – this villain ain’t great. Western mogul Bartholomew Bogue (Peter Sarsgaard) has bought up the town of Rose Creek. Why he needs a sheriff and twenty deputies to bully a churchful 
of farmers is beyond me … but by sheer volume, it establishes that it will take more than Zorro to fell this Wild West antagonist. Now Peter Sarsgaard wasn’t a great villain in Green Lantern, so I’m not sure why anybody thought he’d be a great villain here; R.I.P. Alan Rickman. You are missed.
Nevertheless, new widow Emma Cullen (Haley Bennett) goes a-searchin’ for help. I swear she exists so that this film will have a woman in it. Before long, she discovers and recruits Chisolm (Denzel Washington) busy shootin’ up a saloon half a state over. As Bogue and his nutty pals represent the law and Denzel is Denzel, I thought this film might be making an abuse of power or BLM statement of some kind. However, Chisolm’s race is never mentioned in the film, and he’s also a roaming peace officer of sorts, so it seems the film’s message, if any, is about class warfare. Even at that, it doesn’t really come across.
Chisolm catches the eye of Josh Faraday (Chris Pratt), something of a light-hearted fool-bully. He’s the one guy who doesn’t flinch when Chisolm creates empty barstools. It’s obvious early on that Faraday is that member of the group who exists to piss off every other member of the group. Soon, this becomes yet another counting film. “Ok, we got Ethan Hawke and Byung-hun Lee. What’s with Vincent D’Onofrio’s voice? Did he swallow helium between takes? So that’s 1,2,3,4,5 … are we up to seven yet? Does the woman count? How about her escort? Are they ‘magnificent?’ That guy is impressive, sure, maybe ‘brilliant’ on a good day, but ‘magnificent?’ You’re pushing it, pal.”
All I can say is while the backstories were far from genius, they beat the Hell out of the backstories from Suicide Squad in that they existed.
The conflict setup for Magnificent Seven isn’t terribly different from that in Unforgiven, The Quick and the Dead, and so many other Westerns it made me wonder if all Westerns, in essence, have the same plot: somebody done somebody wrong and a third somebody has to 
intervene. Then shooting. Yeah, that’s pretty much it. Plots were simpler in those times.
The Magnificent Seven of 2016 reunites the Training Day core of Denzel Washington, Ethan Hawke, and director Antoine Fuqua. Of course, it also reunited Jurassic World trio Chris Pratt, Vincent D’Onofrio, and a bloated dinosaur-sized budget. Luckily, Matt Bomer didn’t drag any of his Magic Mike friends into this; that’s a very different bloated Western. Honestly, I think Fuqua does better with character studies than epics. I think the decision to cloud Chisolm’s motivation was a mistake; it asks the audience to judge the man by the chaos he creates rather than having us reflect upon why he’s creating it. Fuqua definitely knows how to film an action scene, but The Magnificent Seven is more of an audience participation type film – let us really know the good guys and bad guys before they duke it out. When the climax hits, I feel like I know next to nothing about either the wicked Bogue or the dapper Chisolm – hey, man, at least give me the cool soundtrack.
And thus we come full circle back to the theme song. There are worse ways to spend an evening than The Magnificent Seven, 2016. I might suggest, however, that if you’re willing to travel this route, consider the classic Akira Kurosawa or the version from 1960.
The baron makes citizens irate
Causing inspiration to retaliate
Wild West Fable
Of outcome unstable
Perhaps they should have brought eight
Rated PG-13, 133 Minutes
D: Antoine Fuqua
W: Richard Wenk and Nic Pizzolatto
Genre: Coat-tailing greatness
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Western fanatics
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Classics fanatics
