The Magnificent Seven


The Magnificent Seven is a 1960 American Western film directed by John Sturges. The screenplay, credited to William Roberts, is a remake – in an Old West-style – of Akira Kurosawa's 1954 Japanese film Seven Samurai. The ensemble cast includes Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter, James Coburn, and Horst Buchholz as a group of seven gunfighters hired to protect a small village in Mexico from a group of marauding bandits led by Eli Wallach.
The film was released by United Artists on October 12, 1960, becoming both a critical and commercial success and has been appraised as one of the greatest films of the Western genre. It spawned three sequels, a television series that aired from 1998 to 2000, and a 2016 film remake. Elmer Bernstein's film score was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Score and is listed on the American Film Institute's list of the top 25 American film scores.
In 2013, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Plot

A gang of bandits led by Calvera periodically raids a poor Mexican village for food and supplies. After the latest raid, during which Calvera kills a villager, the village leaders decide to consult the only man they believe has the wisdom to help them, an elder who lives as a hermit outside the village. The elder advises them to fight back and buy weapons, and if they have no money for weapons, to seek help from other towns where weapons can be obtained.
They send three villagers carrying their few objects of value to try to barter for weapons. In a town just inside the United States, the villagers find and approach gunslinger Chris Adams. Chris advises that they instead hire gunfighters to defend the village, as "men are cheaper than guns."
At first agreeing only to help them recruit, Chris eventually leads the group. Despite the meager pay, Chris finds five willing gunmen. They include Vin Tanner, a gunfighter gone broke from gambling; Chris' friend Harry Luck, who assumes Chris is hiding a much bigger reward for the work; the Irish Mexican Bernardo O'Reilly, who has fallen on hard times; Britt, an expert in both knife and gun who joins purely for the challenge involved; and the dapper, on-the-run gunman Lee, plagued by nightmares of fallen enemies and so haunted that he has lost his nerve for battle. On their way to the village, they are trailed by the hotheaded Chico, an aspiring gunfighter whose previous attempts to join Chris had been spurned. Impressed by his persistence, Chris allows him into the group.
Arriving at the village, they work with the villagers to build fortifications and train them in combat. They note the lack of young women in the village until Chico stumbles upon Petra and discovers the women were hidden in fear that the gunmen would rape them. The gunmen begin to bond with the villagers, and Petra pursues Chico. When Bernardo points out that the gunmen are being given the choice food, they share it with the village children.
Three of Calvera's men are dispatched to reconnoiter the village; due to a mistake by Chico, the seven are forced to kill all three. Some days later, Calvera and his bandits arrive in force. The seven and the villagers kill eleven gang members and run the rest out of town. The villagers celebrate, believing Calvera will not return. However, Chico infiltrates Calvera's camp and learns that Calvera will return, as his men are short of food. Some villagers fear reprisals and call for the gunfighters to leave. Even some of the seven waver, but Chris insists that they stay.
The seven ride out for a preemptive raid on Calvera's camp but find it abandoned. Returning to the village, they are captured by Calvera and his men, who have colluded with some of the villagers to sneak in and take control. Calvera spares the seven's lives, believing they have been disillusioned by the betrayal and fearing reprisals from their friends across the border.
Preparing to depart, Chris and Vin admit they have become emotionally attached to the village. Britt declares that no man will take his gun and see him ride away. Chico insists that he hates the villagers; when Chris points out he grew up as a farmer as well, Chico angrily responds that it is men like Calvera and Chris who made the villagers what they are.
The gang escorts the seven gunmen from the village and returns their weapons. The seven debate their next move. All agree to return and fight, except Harry, who believes the effort is futile and suicidal.
The gunmen infiltrate the village and a gunfight breaks out. Harry, who has had a change of heart, returns in time to save Chris's life but is himself fatally shot. Harry pleads to know what they were fighting for before he dies, and Chris lies about hidden gold to let Harry believe he died for a fortune. Lee finds the nerve to burst into a house where several villagers are being held, shooting their captors and releasing the prisoners to join the fight, but he is gunned down as he leaves the house. Bernardo, shot protecting the boys he befriended, tells them as he dies to see how bravely their fathers fought. Britt dies after killing many bandits and exposing himself from cover. Chris shoots Calvera, who asks why he came back for the village before dying. The remaining bandits flee.
Chris, Vin, and Chico bid farewell to the village elder. The elder tells them that only the villagers have won, whereas the gunslingers are "like the wind, blowing over the land and passing on." As they pause for one last glance back at the village, Chico decides to stay with Petra. As Chris and Vin pass the graves of their fallen comrades, Chris admits the elder was right.

Cast

The Seven

Development

Lou Morheim acquired rights to remake the film in the US for $2,500. He later signed a deal with Yul Brynner's production company, who bought the rights from Morheim for $10,000 up front plus $1,000 a week as a producer and 5% of the net profits. Anthony Quinn was lined up to star with Brynner as director but later Martin Ritt was appointed as director with Brynner starring.
Brynner approached producer Walter Mirisch with the idea of remaking Kurosawa's famous samurai film. However, once Mirisch had acquired the rights and finalized a deal with United Artists, Brynner was sued for breach of contract by Quinn, who claimed that he and Brynner had developed the concept together and had worked out many of the film's details before the two had a falling-out. Quinn ultimately lost his claim because there was nothing in writing.
The film's title comes from the initial American localized title of Seven Samurai, which was initially released under the title The Magnificent Seven in the United States in 1955.

Writing

Script credit was a subject of contention. Associate producer Morheim commissioned Walter Bernstein, a blacklisted scriptwriter, to produce the first draft "faithfully" adapted from the original script written by Shinobu Hashimoto, Hideo Oguni and Akira Kurosawa; when Mirisch and Brynner took over the production, they brought on Walter Newman, whose version "is largely what's onscreen." When Newman was unavailable to be onsite during the film's principal photography in Mexico, William Roberts was hired, in part to make changes required by Mexican censors. When Roberts asked the Writers Guild of America for a co-credit, Newman asked that his name be removed from the credits.

Casting

Sturges was eager to cast Steve McQueen in the picture, having just worked with him on the 1959 film Never So Few, but McQueen could not get a release from actor/producer Dick Powell, who controlled McQueen's hit TV series Wanted Dead or Alive. On the advice of his agent, McQueen, an experienced race car driver, staged a car accident and claimed that he could not work on his series because he had suffered a whiplash injury and had to wear a neck brace. During the interval required for his "recuperation", he was free to appear in The Magnificent Seven. James Coburn was a great fan of the Japanese film Seven Samurai, having seen it 15 times, while studying with Stella Adler. Not long before shooting, after meeting in the street, the already-cast and former Los Angeles City College classmate Robert Vaughn, he was hired for his coveted role of the expert knifethrower, that had been rejected by actors Sterling Hayden and John Ireland.

Filming

The film was shot by cinematographer Charles Lang in a 35 mm anamorphic format using Panavision lenses. Location shooting began on March 1, 1960, in Mexico, where both the village and the U.S. border town were built for the film. The location filming was in Cuernavaca, Durango, and Tepoztlán and at the Estudios Churubusco. The first scenes were the first part of the six gunfighters' journey to the Mexican village prior to Chico being brought into the group.
During filming there was considerable tension between Brynner and McQueen, who was displeased at his character having only seven lines of dialogue in the original shooting script. To compensate, McQueen took numerous opportunities to upstage Brynner and draw attention to himself, including shielding his eyes with his hat, flipping a coin during one of Brynner's speeches, and rattling his shotgun shells. Brynner would often build up a little mound of earth to make himself look as tall as McQueen, only to have McQueen kick the dirt out of place when he passed by. When newspapers started reporting about a rivalry, Brynner issued a press statement saying, "I never feud with actors. I feud with studios."
In an interview Eli Wallach recalled his own interaction with fellow players: "Bronson was a loner. He kept to himself. I liked Robert Vaughn and James Coburn very much. Vaughn is a very intelligent guy. He wrote a book on blacklisting. Coburn was one of those quiet types which fit his character very well: silent but a knife thrower of great skill."