Adam-Troy Castro

Writer of Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Stories About Yams.

 

GUNS OF THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1969)

Posted on May 20th, 2016 by Adam-Troy Castro

Tonight’s film from the MAGNIFICENT SEVEN COLLECTION, of which I’ve said before it is likely best to consider to consider all the films but the first DVD extras in support of the splendid John Sturges original, was GUNS OF THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1969), which wisely makes no attempt to torture all possible plausibility by again re-uniting all three characters who survived the first two films. That would be just silly.

Instead, it brings back only the Yul Brynner character Chris Adams, now improbably played by George Kennedy, who is again summoned to a crisis in Mexico, but this time brings along six guys unrelated to the action of the prior two films.

We started with James Coburn, Steve McQueen, and Charles Bronson. Now we get Monte Markham, Bernie Casey, an already-long-in-the-tooth James Whitmore, and Joe Don Baker.  A certain devolution in terms of star power, befitting the fact that all this franchise really had, at this point, was loyalty to a brand. At this point in Hollywood history, westerns (which once comprised more than half of all movies made) were not dead, but they were coughing very hard.

I am relieved to tell you that this movie, while still not good, is still better than RETURN OF THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, a small achievement, but closer to that film than THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, and about a million miles of bad road away from the inspiration, SEVEN SAMURAI.

Still, this is better than being buried up to your neck the hot sun and having brutal Mexican soldiers order their horses to kick you in your head, which is something that happens to a couple of dozen prisoners of the bad guy in this film.

One of the reasons this film is better than the first sequel is that George Kennedy, watching this sorry spectacle, gets to act sickened instead of just grimly resolute, as the Yul Brynner incarnation of his character might have done. He goes after the bad guy, at the end, because he’s personally offended by that kind of behavior, and this is a commendable attitude.

Also, when he finds out at the end of the final battle that four members of his team have died, he gets to act shocked and sickened all over again – though frankly I don’t why he’s always so surprised by this result; so far, every time he’s led men into one of these missions, four have died and three have survived. His continued insistence on always putting together teams of seven is here explained by the claim that he now sees it as a lucky number, which would really piss off the doomed characters played by Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Brad Dexter, and Robert Vaughn in film number one. Sure, they would say. It’s a lucky number for you, asshole.

Four points.

One: early on in the film, he rescues Monte Markham from being hanged as a horse thief by pointing out to the townspeople that nobody asked the horse to testify, and having it identify its owner. This he does by positioning the complaining party one side of the street, and Monte Markham – who IS guilty — right in front of the water trough, which the horse naturally heads for. This saves Markham’s ass in the eyes of the townspeople, and I’ve got to tell you, what this says to me is that this must be the stupidest town in the west.

Two: I made my wife snarf food at a certain point where we noted that the seven this time include an old guy, a suicidal man dying of consumption, and a guy with one paralyzed arm. A major come-down, we noted, from the squad of uniformly dangerous men who populated the first film. Then I said, “It’s the Best-We-Could-Do-At-The-Time Seven.” And Judi snarfed, which was really the most entertaining moment of the entire enterprise.

Three: During the final battle, angry black guy Bernie Casey fulfills action-movie protocol and dies first. It is only by seconds, as the repentant one-armed racist played by Joe Don Baker dies almost immediately afterward later trying to avenge him, but yes, the black guy dies first, technically. Or maybe he’s still lingering when Joe Don Baker dies. Either way, he gets shot first. (The two have previously bonded, despite a rough beginning, by longish conversations over who has it more rough, a black guy or a white gunslinger with only one working arm, which in 1969 was enlightened.)

Four: At the end, George Kennedy and James Whitmore ride off, virtuously leaving behind the six hundred dollars they and the others were paid to come to the aid of the oppressed. This act, likely a partial inspiration for the tribute film THREE AMIGOS, makes perfect sense for Kennedy’s character Chris Adams, who actually seems to relish having to ride down to Mexico every couple of years for little or no money, shoot a whole lot of people, and get more than half his team killed. But when the Whitmore character was first introduced, we learned that he was slaving away on a failing homestead, supporting a family he had to feed a gaseous diet of beans, and desperate for the money he needed to dig his place a well that can transform his failing farm into a successful one. So if he doesn’t get any money, he’s still royally fucked. I would like to imagine that his old buddy Chris came up with the bright idea to refuse payment at the end, and that the two of them rode all the way back to Texas or whatever, where Whitmore’s piece of shit farm still sat ready to suck away all the energy of his retiring years, before his old buddy Chris told him what was up. Boy, that would have been a fun scene.

One Response to "GUNS OF THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1969)"

  1. Another point I didn’t bring up in my essay — I didn’t mind George Kennedy walking around with massive underarm stains during scenes set in the Mexico desert. That is realism. What I didn’t like was when he turned his ass to the camera and revealed a wet spot the size of a quarter. Not a fleeting glimpse, either. It was THERE.

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