Please read this review, it might change your filmviewing life (Seven (DVD))

Member Name: phill@leeds

Product:	Seven (DVD)
Date:	02/02/03 (62 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: An acting tour de'force, Poetry and History included!, Shitteningly scary in more ways than one

Disadvantages: are you kidding?

Se7en is one hell of a film. You could pigeonhole it in the ‘horror thriller’ genre, but it’s infinitely better than that could ever sound. It sees David Fincher direct a story that works on many levels; Se7en is at once shocking, exciting, appalling; it forces you to laugh at terribly inappropriate occasions, beguiles and touches the heart. I almost cried at the end of this film, which was at least the 10th time I’d watched it. I would argue that this film will go down in movie annals to come, as the finest of its type. It really is superb.

Se7en tells the tale of John Doe (the ever-excellent Kevin Spacey) – our highly intelligent, sadist murderer, Detectives David Mills (Brad Pitt) and William Somerset (Morgan Freeman), and to some significant extent, Mill’s wife Tracey (Gwyneth Paltrow). The murder of a grotesquely obese man (looking similar to Meatloaf, but isn’t!) instigates the retribution of 7 humans for each of their 7 deadly sins. Hereby, Mill’s and Somerset are uncomfortably assigned to the case as partners. Their strained relationship underpins the entire movie.

Our protagonists here are such excellent characters that supporting cast are effectively reduced to mere extras. Somerset is a world-weary retiring cop, with an age worn cynicism and a classically intelligent brain. He is a man teetering over the edge - once calm and considered; now displaying fragilty, anxiety and utter disillusion. Mills is fresh-faced, enthusiastic, intent on making good the world he sees before him. Though Pitt isn’t naïve, he is certainly not accustomed to the seedy underbelly of an American city he finds himself in. John Doe is a mysterious, calculating presence, like Hopkins’ Dr. Lecter, whose acutely perceptive beliefs become all too apparent during the film. He is most definitely accustomed to this city.

Above, I said the film works on many levels. What I mean is it exists as a psychol
ogical who-done-it, a slow burning thriller, an anti-Hollywood, un-formulaic, dystopian masterpiece. Se7en is stylish and subtle, deploying Fincher’s distinctive camerawork and offering grim, atmospheric settings in most scenes. It is a deeply dark and intense too, not caring to tender anything affirmative, or even moderately successful (from the detectives view) in its world. The ending is as imaginative, intelligent and horrific as not only the entire film, but as any ending to a move ever. Its just terrific direction, scripting and acting – especially on the part of Pitt and Freeman.

I hope this review gives insight into an excellent movie, not otherwise found here in dooyoo. To further this aim, I’ve included some trivia for those who have already seen it, from davidfincher.net…

>The number 7 shows up in many places throughout the film. Detective Somerset is invited for a late dinner... at 7pm. The climactic delivery was to be made at 7pm. All the building numbers in the opening scene start with 7.
>The producers intended for Kevin Spacey to receive front billing at the start of the movie but he insisted that his name not appear in the opening credits, so as to surprise the audience with the identity of the killer. To compensate, he is listed first in the closing credits.
>Mills and William Somerset discuss the book "Of Human Bondage", which was written by W. Somerset Maugham, one of writer Andrew Kevin Walker's favorite writers.

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