THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1960)

MORGAN'S RATING

A small farming Mexican village that makes involuntary donations of its harvest to a gang of bandits lead by Calvera decides to hire a group of professional gunmen, headed by gunslinger-for-hire Chris, to protect them. Despite the meager pay, Chris and Vin sign on after the Mexicans see them face down some racist thugs. Chris begins to pick up other gunmen, including Bernardo, Lee, Britt, Harry, and aspiring gunslinger Chico, as they ride back to the village. The Mexicans, who are at first ambivalent about having gunmen hanging around their town, finally let down their guard and allow their visitors to teach them how to shoot and how to best reconfigure the town to defend against Calvera. When the bandits return, they find harvesting the crops a little more challenging.

Yul Brynner (Chris Adams), Eli Wallach (Calvera, Bandit Leader), Steve McQueen (Vin), Horst Buchholz (Chico), Charles Bronson (Bernardo O'Reilly), Robert Vaughn (Lee), Brad Dexter (Harry Luck), James Coburn (Britt), Rosenda Monteros (Petra), Vladimir Sokoloff (Old Man), Jorge Martinez de Hoyos (Hilario), Rico Alaniz (Sotero), Pepe Hern, Natividad Vacio (Miguel), Mario Navarro, Danny Bravo, John A. Alonzo (Villager Miguel), Enrique Lucero, Alex Montoya, Robert J. Wilke (Wallace), Val Avery (Henry), Whit Bissell (Chamlee the Undertaker), Bing Russell (Robert), Robert Contreras (Villager, uncredited), Valentin de Vargas (Calvera henchman, uncredited), Larry Duran (uncredited).

THEY WERE SEVEN...AND THEY FOUGHT LIKE SEVEN HUNDRED!

PRODUCTION INFORMATION

DIRECTOR: John Sturges (Chino). WRITERS: Walter Newman, William Roberts (additions), and Walter Bernstein (uncredited), and based on an earlier screenplay by Akira Kurosawa, Shinobu Hashimoto and Hodeo Oguni (all uncredited). PRODUCER: John Sturges. ASSOCIATE PRODUCER: Lou Morheim. EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Walter Mirisch. ORIGINAL MUSIC: Elmer Bernstein. DISTRIBUTOR: MGM/UA

QUOTES

FACTS

Lee: Yes. The final supreme idiocy. Coming here to hide. The deserter hiding out in the middle of a battlefield.

RELEASE DATE: October 23rd, 1960 (USA) SHOOTING DATES: March 1960 -- April 1960 - Robert Vaughn played the role of Lee in the film. He later came back to star in the TV series, playing the role of Judge Oren Travis. - Elmer Bernstein, whose score for this movie is one of the best-known ever composed, also wrote the score for the Magnificent Seven parody, !Three Amigos! (1986). - A remake of Akira Kurosawa's Shichinin no samurai (1954). - Yul Brynner was married on the set; the celebration used many of the same props as the fiesta scene. The film was cast quickly to beat an actor's strike. Mexican censors required the peasants to always be wearing clean clothes. - Walter Bernstein did the original adaptation of Kurowsawa's film but it wasn't used. Walter Newman wrote the screenplay that is substantially what you see on screen. - Composer John Williams was a member of the orchestra which recorded Elmer Bernstein's score; he played the piano. - James Coburn's friend Robert Vaughn recommended him to director John Sturges for the last remaining lead, the role of Britt. Sturges said he needed a Gary Cooper type actor, and Vaughn said Coburn was the actor he needed. - Steve McQueen wanted to act in this film, but could not at first because the schedule for his TV series, "Wanted Dead or Alive" (1958) would not allow it. He crashed a car and while he was "out sick", he shot this film. - Nominated for one Academy Award for Best Musical Score (Elmer Bernstein).

Vin: We deal in lead, my friend.

Chico: But who made us the way we are, huh? Men with guns. Men like Calvera, and men like you...and now me.

Britt: Nobody throws me my own guns and says run. Nobody.

Calvera: If God hadn't meant for them to be sheared, he wouldn't have made them sheep.

Hilario: Even if we had the guns, we know how to plant and grow, we don't know how to kill. Old Man: Then learn, or die!

[Britt has just shot a fleeing bandit off his horse.] Chico: Ah, that was the greatest shot I've ever seen. Britt: The worst! I was aiming at the horse.

Chris: The old man was right. Only the farmers won. We lost. We always lose.

Calvera: I should have guessed. When my men didn't come back I should have guessed. How many of you did they hire? Chris: Enough!

CRITICAL COMMENTS

"A rousing adventure story that not only includes a brilliant cast, but explores some of the deeper contradictions of the mysthic noble outlaw." -- James Kendrick, Q Network Film Desk

"One of the most popular Westerns of all time, the heroic story of The Magnificent Seven has influenced countless other movies in nearly every genre." -- David Forsmark, Credo