Seven

Rating:
Summary: Fincher works magic on the mind's eye
Review: In the interest of full disclosure, let me tell you some things about myself:

I am a Brad Pitt fan. I am a Morgan Freeman fan. I am a David Fincher fan. I am a fan of serial killer movies.

So we've perfected the recipe here, then. All of those elements are at the top of their game.

Pitt is immature and kinetic, strong-willed and strong-headed. He plays off Freeman perfectly. Freeman, for his part, is quiet and thoughtful. You can see just from his eyes that he is tired and spent, but feels that this one last case is important and necessary. He does his duty. He is a rock (to Pitt's roll?). David Fincher is Fincher. His style is just so addicting when he's working with a plausible (in context) script. He gets to build an anonymous city, making it dreadful and sickening, and run his characters through its mill. Everything is dark and wet, never letting you take a breath. Gwyneth Paltrow, in two brief scenes, is quite sweet and touching, exhibiting both humour (with Pitt) and torment (with Freeman). I usually can do without her, but here she is a welcome relief from all the bleakness. And of course one of my favourite actors plays the killer, with shaved-head intensity. It's a great secret that - even though it's already out of the bag - I won't tell.

...yecapS niveK s'tI

Top to bottom, this is a great movie. From the first seconds of the first scene, through the opening credits (they look like a Nine Inch Nails video), to the last moments of the closing credits, it's just great. Every scene is pulled off perfectly; all the details are just right. Morgan Freeman looking up Dante in the library; the killer's dank little apartment; Pitt and Freeman bonding over beers in a bar... all superbly done. Of course, the best parts are the murder scene aftermaths, based on the seven deadly sins. You never see any violence in these scenes, but what you do see is actually a bit more disturbing: gritty tableaus of human suffering. Fincher's greatest choice is not showing us all that's going on, letting the mind of the viewer fill in most of the grisly details. My favourite is the 'lust' sequence. I didn't fully understand what had happened until I watched the movie a second time. And now I can't get the imagery out of my head. It works quite powerfully.

And the denouement is just staggering. It's 15 minutes of slow build-up. You hope that the payoff can live up to the suspense. And they keep going. And the suspense builds. And you hope... and you hope... and you hope.... And the payoff is brilliant. It perfectly sums up the films themes, and is a very satisfying narrative conclusion to a highly suspenseful mystery/thriller movie. And my favourite part about the ending: after 2 hours of dirty, dark, and rainy, the film ends at high noon in an open field. A great contrast, that. Fincher really knows how to use imagery to make a point.

Rating:
Summary: What's in the box?
Review: Calling SEVEN a detective thriller is almost like calling ANNA KARENINA a romance novel. Still, ostensibly that's what it is. It deals with the hunt for a serial killer (Kevin Spacey) committing murders based on the seven deadly sins. The job of finding him falls to two police detectives: Somerset (Morgan Freeman)- a wise, dignified but burned-out veteran, literally days from retirement- and his partner, Mills (Brad Pitt)- an impatient, ambitious newcomer.

While SEVEN is a rollercoaster of disturbing surprises, it's hardly just a lurid thrill ride. The final twist is a horrific reminder that murder is a human tragedy and that even ordinary human failings won't escape this killer's fanatically pitiless judgment. There are illustrations throughout of the indifference and dehumanization on which evil thrives- the sex shop owner who casually custom-makes a potentially lethal erotic aid, for example.

Be warned: SEVEN is extremely graphic. (At the morgue, for example, you see everything they kept out of frame on QUINCY. And then there's Sloth...) The visual design creates a fittingly dank, decaying urban environment. My favorite scene, however, was Somerset doing research after hours at a library while a radio played classical music. It's a transcendently serene moment in a violent and corrupt world.

There are fine performances. Although Pitt is well cast and Spacey gives the killer a fine, restrained portrayal, the real screen presences are Gwyneth Paltrow (Mills' wife, Tracy) and Freeman. Paltrow, of course, is one of the great beauties of our time but Freeman's quiet charisma is amazing.

The DVD is somewhat awkward. It must be flipped over. The scene selection feature indexes large chunks (the sins, mostly) not the numbered scenes. While cast bios seem thorough (Freeman was on ELECTRIC COMPANY!), there are no interviews or documentaries. Still, little can diminish this film's power.

Rating:
Summary: seven is a good movie
Review: I watched seven for the first time this past weekend at a friends party it was very good it had good actors and good screen play the visual affects were also very interesting the only part that I did't care for was when freeman and pitt took the killer out in the dessert and freeman opened the box and it had the head of the woman who played pitt's wife in the movie in it and the killer said she had begged for her life and the unborn baby in her stomach.

Rating:
Summary: Dante, Film Noir, and Nihilism
Review: This movie is one of the more intelligent and subtle movies to have come out of Hollywood in some time. Like Dante's Inferno and the seven circles of Hell that comprise it, Brad Pitt (Dante's wayward pilgrim) and Morgan Freeman (Dante's Virgil and voice of Reason) make their way through Hell -- New York city -- exposed to the various ways humankind distorts itself through sin. Here, film noir gives way to allegory as Kevin Spacey's character, the personification of the demonic, rejects God and seeks to 'create' his own work of art through his various murders. In all of this it is not hard to see a commentary on the "modern artist" since at least the Romantic period: artists seek to transfigure and transform the world through the act of creation in the hopes of establishing the aesthetic as a means of transcending an unresponsive world that seems devoid of all meaning. Spacey's nihilism is the modern artist and demonic par excellence: his rejection of God as expressed in his evil, 'ultimate art work' is his only means of affirmation since, through his murders, he 'creates' an aesthetic wholeness that transvalues the very morality and order he believes has caused the stultifying world responsible for his incompleteness. Here, the suggestion seems to be that the modern/romantic artist creates not only as an act of rebellion but out of a narcissicism rooted in impotence and nihilism: Kevin Spacey doesn't just kill those he feels have no right to live, he rejects God and mistakenly places himself on the same moral plain as God through his destruction of, and judgement on God's creation and plan for it. In this sense, Seven raises important questions about nihilism, art, and the artist. Morgan Freeman's Virgil raises further interesting questions. Unlike Dante's Divine Comedy where the pilgrim passes through Purgatory and into Paradise, Seven ends with no apparent salvation or deliverance for Mankind. Here, perhaps Seven itself is guilty of the sort of nihilism it wants to condemn. In classic film noir fashion, Freeman seems to leave the viewer with the idea that even though it isn't clear if there is an ultimate Good or if it is just absent from the world, we must believe and act as if there were by confronting and rejecting evil -- hence Freeman's attempt to prevent Brad Pitt's character from doing what he does in the end. Regardless of what Freeman's character ultimately means, Seven is worth watching and thinking about. Its darkness and decadence is appropriate once one realizes where one is -- in the Inferno.

Rating:
Summary: Haunting Tale
Review: Director David Fincher's dark, stylish thriller easily ranks as one of the decade's most frightening and suspenseful films. Set in a hellish vision of New York, where it is always raining and the air crackles with impending death, the film concerns Det. William Somerset (Morgan Freeman), a homicide specialist just one week from a well-deserved retirement. Every minute of his 32 years on the job is evident in Somerset's worn, exhausted face, and his soul aches with the pain which can only come from having seen and felt far too much. But Somerset's retirement must wait for one last case, for which he is teamed with young hotshot David Mills (Brad Pitt), the fiery detective set to replace him at the end of the week. Mills has talked his reluctant wife Tracy (Gwyneth Paltrow) into moving into the big city so that he could tackle important cases, but his first and Somerset's last are more than either man has bargained for. A diabolical serial killer is staging grisly murders, choosing victims representing the seven deadly sins. First, an obese man is forced to eat until his stomach ruptures to represent Gluttony, then a wealthy defense lawyer is made to cut off a pound of his own flesh as penance for Greed. Somerset initially refuses to take the case, realizing that there will be five more murders, ghastly sermons about Lust, Sloth, Pride, Wrath, and Envy presented by a madman to a sinful world. Somerset is correct, and something within him cannot let the case go, forcing the weary detective to team with Mills and see the case to its almost unspeakably horrible conclusion. Fincher's deadly serious film benefits from wonderfully moody photography by Darius Khondji and a tension-filled script by Andrew Kevin Walker. The nauseatingly vivid special effects (particularly the remarkable Sloth murder) are among the most effective ever done by makeup artist Rob Bottin, best known for more fantasy-oriented work in films like The Howling (1981). Seven, however, really belongs to Morgan Freeman, who turns in the best performance of his career as Somerset, whose every word and expression gives credence to the theory that once a man looks into the abyss for too long, it starts to look back at him. R. Lee Ermey, Richard Roundtree, and Kevin Spacey co-star in this haunting, atmospheric masterpiece.

Rating:
Summary: A Shock to the System
Review: A gentleman I talked to once said he didn't like this film because the police never turned on a light in any room they went into. Apparently, he forgot this was a movie. I was impressed not only by the cinematography and art direction and set design but by Brad Pitt's ability to maintain a high level of acting skill opposite the great Morgan Freeman. This is not a film for the squeamish. Even if the scenes of violence acts pale next to the slasher films of the past several years, the intention and the theme of this movie are enough to perpetuate nightmares. Unlike many horror films, this suspense thriller WILL make you think. And sometimes the human mind is a scarier landscape than the film screen.

Rating:
Summary: Seven is a brilliant, dark, and disturbing film.
Review: Seven is one of the greatest, most atmospheric thrillers ever made.

Andrew Kevin Walker takes, what seems to be on the surface, an unoriginal concept and makes it his own; producing one of the most original screenplays of the 90's.

David Fincher does a fine job as the director of Seven. His direction compliments the gritty screenplay nicely. He effectively brings the script's many stunning suspense sequences to life.

Howard Shore gives us a great restrained and ominous musical score.

Darius Khondji's cinematography also pays respect to the script by making the images on screen very dark.

The set design is wonderfully detailed and greatly adds to the mood.

Brad Pitt is pretty good as the cocky detective, David Mills, but he could be more dramatic in some of his more emotional scenes. Morgan Freemen is good but I feel that he underplays his character, William Somerset, a bit too much sometimes. Kevin Spacey gives the best performance of the film as the psychopath, John Doe. He speaks his lines with cold brutality. He is riveting to watch.

Seven's pacing is good for the most part; one or two scenes tend to drag on a bit too long, but I suppose this is to help build the suspense.

Seven is a great film; a cinematic gem of the 90's.

This is probably my favorite DVD. The picture quailty of this DVD is good. The commentaries and featurettes are very informative. I like how Fincher's tone and manner is almost conversational in the commentaries.

Rating:
Summary: More then meets the eye
Review: A thriller with meaning and style.Good directing from David Fincher.Unlike his other fellow-MTV-music-directors he shows allot of promise.We will forgive him for ALIEN 3, but with his other films since like,THE GAME and FIGHT CLUB(as with this one) he proves he can show us something truely dark and still have the respect to tell us a good story along the way.Seven is good only because everyone involved from Morgan Freeman to Brad Pitt gives out standout performes.It's dark and takes it time, but don't look away because you'll be rewarded with one of the best films from the 90's.

Rating:
Summary: The Se7en Deadly Sins...
Review: It's about time this fine film gets a New Line Platinum Series release. Definitely the best film from director David Fincher. Incredible performances from Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman, Gwyneth Paltrow and Kevin Spacey. Now I've read the screenplay for "Se7en" and the film really stays with the screenplay by Andrew Kevin Walker. The differences from the screenplay to film is the entire beginning, a much longer/slightly different ending and very small character details. These should all be included on this 2 discs DVD release and much more. It's great to know that the director and the entire cast fought the studio to have the ending as close to the screenplay as possible. Of course the studio wanted the ending to be more censored. But let me tell you "Se7en" has one of the very best endings to a film. It really completes the film to make it a great film. A Top 10 of all time type movie. Needless to say anything I write about the plot will somehow spoil it for those who know nothing about the movie. The contrast between Detectives Mills and Somerset is incredible yet in the end they stand for the same ideals. Well it's about a killer named John Doe who uses the seven deadly sins against the sinners themselves. Detective Mills is the younger of the 2 detectives; he's just full of life and energy. He really loves his job. Detective Somerset the older, more patient is on the verge of retirement. He won't miss the big city and all the crime too much when he retires. They must work together to try and stop the series of seven. Honestly, just buy this Platinum Series DVD as soon as it is available or right now.

Rating:
Summary: Thrills and Chills
Review: Brad Pitt plays the new cop on the block, teamed up with an older, experienced cop (Morgan Freeman) to try to find the killer. This killer is different, though. He's not just offing people at random; he's choosing his victims wisely by the sins they have committed. He is being careful. So careful that right up until the last fourth of the movie, they're completely unsure of who it is.

So its pretty typical -- guy dies, they search the house, question some people, come just an eighth of an inch to getting the killer... but with a few exceptions. (Oh my God, the "DEAD" guy on bed! That scared me half to death.) The end was good. Not so much as typical. Just really good.

Overall, a four star movie with some predictable parts but a REALLY good ending. (Ending got it another star.)