Derivative, disgusting and downbeat

Rating: 1/10 (29 February 2000)

Seven is the sort of film that takes several formulaic concepts, dresses them up with something trendy (title screens beginning and end, making me wonder if the guy from Homicide got paid), uses stock characterisations, piles on the repulsiveness on the excuse of realism, and then watches the money come in. What we have here is the age-old veteran approaching retirement teamed with a young, aggressive rookie. The parts played somewhat predictably by Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt. The killer in this movie plans to murder six people (seven dead in total) according to the seven deadly sins, hence the title. The ways in which this is accomplished in five of these seems to be calculated to be incredibly disgusting, repulsive and downright offensive. The scriptwriters here certainly are no fan of Hitchcock, but rather King. The result of which was to basically make me feel slightly ill and disinterested in the film as a whole. Now if they had bothered to put as much effort into the characterisation of messrs Freeman and Pitt, this would have been a far better movie. As it stands, you care very little for either of them as they just do not seem like real people at all. (I get to put a second reference to Homicide:LOTS as a reference point as to how it should be done) Cinematographally speaking, the majority of the film seems intent on portraying the city as a "Bladerunner by day", muting most things in dull, washed out colours together with lots and lots of Rain. Gritty? Yes. Depressing? Yes. Boring? Eventually. Two good things about this film. 1) The titles are pretty groovy, like, man. 2) Kevin Spacey finally gets a shot at making big movies, not before time. But that is it.