Classic Western: The Magnificent Seven

The Magnificent Seven (1960)
directed by John Sturges
starring Yul Brynner, Eli Wallach, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Robert Vaughn, Horst Buchholz, Brad Dexter

Everybody likes to see a bully get his, especially when the underdogs deliver the comeuppance themselves.

The story of The Magnificent Seven is an enduring one, which is no doubt why it keeps getting remade. Itself cribbed from Akira Kurosawa's 1954 Seven Samurai, this film gets another version this September 23 by director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, The Italian Job) with Denzel Washington in the Yul Brynner role.



As a fan of old movies, I find it disheartening whenever a studio decides to "update" a film classic because inevitably they tinker with the script's best elements and make a mess of things. Here's hoping that Fuqua doesn't add too many extraneous details or an unnecessary love interest.

SYNOPSIS & SPOILERS

When a village of poor Mexican farmers sees its crops stolen and its women threatened for the umpteenth time by sneering bandit Calvera (Eli Wallach) and his crew of roaming outlaws, they decide they have no choice but to fight for their survival. They hire on a group of American mercenaries, led by Yul Brynner (with his usual accent, though this time he's supposed to be a Creole), to get them guns and train them in tactical warfare to ward off the bully next time he shows. Among the group of gunfighters are old hands Charles Bronson and Steve McQueen, long and lean James Coburn, cardsharp smoothie Robert Vaughn, reliable Brad Dexter and firebrand youngblood Horst Buchholz.

We're supposed to believe that Brynner and his cohorts are interested in fairness and justice, not just money; in an early scene Brynner and newly acquainted pal McQueen take a dare to drive the hearse carrying a dead Indian to the all-white town cemetery for a proper burial, something the white residents of the town try to prevent. The bigots get winged by a few bullets from the heroes in the process.

Once Brynner gathers up his posse, they travel across the border to the town and start weighing their options. Another indication of the group's "righteousness" is when the villagers gather up their meager resources to fete the mercenaries with a big feast. The men learn that most of the town's children are hungry and decide to share their meal. Look, gunslingers have hearts too!

Calvera shows his sweaty face again with 40 of his men and battles The Seven head on; as a result Calvera's crew gets their numbers significantly thinned out. Despite this early victory for the villagers, things turn more deadly when Calvera returns and takes over ("If God didn't want them sheared, he wouldn't have made them sheep" says Calvera of the villagers). This prompts one last shootout with the gunslingers that eventually kills Calvera, who can't quite seem to believe he's been bested by this crew and asks Brynner "why did you come here?" before kicking the bucket. Victory, yes, but the shootout has also left four of The Seven dead in the streets.

The Magnificent Seven is about good versus evil.

It's about the power of revenge -- but also what it costs to achieve.

It's also about male camaraderie; brotherhood in the service of a noble cause. This is a theme that has driven many a war film, not to mention dozens of "buddy" flicks.

And with its cast of tough guys, who have plenty of "cool" and swagger to spare, The Magnificant Seven still serves as a model of what the ultimate Man's Man is supposed to be: cool under fire; full of heart; ready and able to do the right thing; protector of women, children, and the downtrodden; but cold-blooded when necessary.

Unfortunately, the film bears the stamp of the "white savior" movie plot so prevalent throughout film history, though "The Magnificent Seven" tries hard to preach an equality-type message. Nevertheless, the Mexican villagers go hat in hand to the Americans for help, and find themselves learning how to stand up for themselves from the white Yankees.

Women do appear in the film, but they have no real agency. The village hides its women in the forest to protect them against the marauders until Buchholz smokes one out and forces her to share information. But in this film the men have no time for romance, and that's one of the things I like about it. Rather a film with no part for women, than a film that gets sticky with unnecessary liaisons or that shows off the rampant sexism pervasive both at the time the story was set and the time it was filmed.

A story of persistence and courage in the face of danger never goes out of style. Combined with great widescreen cinematography and a taut soundtrack, The Magnificent Seven is a magnificent western classic.

Classic Western: The Big Country

The Big Country (1958)
Directed by William Wyler
starring Gregory Peck, Charlton Heston, Jean Simmons, Burl Ives, Carroll Baker, Chuck Connors

An epic-sized story about two families warring over access to The Big Muddy river in the western frontier, The Big Country is at heart a meditation on war and peace and what it means to be a man.

Former East Coast sea captain James McKay (Gregory Peck), a peace-loving gentleman scholar (who may be a Quaker) whose father died in a "meaningless duel," comes out West to marry the rich girl Patricia (Carroll Baker) he met in Boston. From the moment he arrives he finds himself caught up in the battle between her bellicose father The Major (Charles Bickford) and his less elegant ranching rival Hannassey (a fabulous Burl Ives). It being the Wild West and all, McKay is challenged to put up his dukes at every turn: by the local bad boys led by Hannassey's son Buck (Chuck Connors) who prank and goad him, by The Major's laconic chief cowhand Steve (Charlton Heston in one of few second-banana roles) who also has eyes for Patricia, and by The Major himself, who wants McKay to take up arms in the ongoing water access war with his sworn foe Hannassey in a you're-either-with-me-or-against-me scenario.

Viewing the capacity for violence and aggression as not the true measures of manhood, McKay demurs or laughs off attempts to rile him, and is labeled a coward and a weakling. He can't understand The Major's escalating hatred for Hannassey, and notes that it's not his fight. And none of the cowboy lunks on the ranch give "the dude" credit for his strengths, like McKay's finally breaking "Old Thunder," the hellish ranch bronco, on his own terms, or when McKay -- an experienced seafarer -- goes riding off into the prairie overnight to take a look around, guided by his compass, only to have The Major send out hysterical search parties. Even when they find McKay calmly breakfasting at a prairie campfire and offering them coffee, they won't believe that he was never lost. His fickle fiancee Patricia is embarrassed and loses the faith, breaking off the engagement after McKay purchases The Big Muddy as a wedding present though making it clear he will not block Hannassey from watering his cattle there. Only Patricia's schoolmarm friend Julie (Jean Simmons) can see that McKay is nobly striving to attain something bigger and more equitable for everyone.

Finally Cowhand Steve has to give McKay his props; as animosity ramps up between them, McKay finally succumbs to fisticuffs but only during pre-dawn hours with no witnesses. The two fight to exhaustion with no winner, proving that throwing punches can't resolve real issues. But with a little more respect for McKay's eastern grit, Steve is the one who tries to stop a hellbent Major from committing what amounts to a massacre of Hannassey and his kin after they kidnap Julie to force her to hand over the deed to The Big Muddy -- something she's already sold to McKay.

In the final shootout it's just The Major versus Hannassey and both are killed, clearing the way for a new truce between the families. But did they really have to die? None of the characters feel good about how things are concluded. The irony is that though the sheer size of this barely settled region is constantly commented upon -- "It's a big country" is noted by at least four characters -- it wasn't big enough for two hard-headed patriarchs to co-exist. McKay's view of the senselessness of violence is justified.

The film is notable not only for the incredible cinematography capturing the endless vistas of the untouched West, but for the fantastic soundtrack by Jerome Moross, heightened in the thrilling overhead opening sequence following a thundering stagecoach through the sagebrush with the mesas in the distance. That rousing opening is a Western classic worth experiencing on its own, even if you don't watch the rest of the yarn.