Dark, Disturbing, Moody, and Excellent

Rating: 10/10 (17 February 2010)

David Fincher has always had a very different style from that of other directors. Whether it is The Curious Case of Benjamin Button's drowned out feel or Fight Club's frenetic hipster camera-work, it's Se7en that definitely is his best film. Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt give excellent performances while the script engrosses the audience. Any way one looks at it, this film is great and there's no doubt about it.
Se7en follows two detectives (Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt) in their search to find "Jonathan Doe" (who later appears as Kevin Spacey), a murderer who has been leaving crime scenes that follow the Seven Deadly Sins. Freeman is great as an old, wise detective who is ready to retire while Pitt only good as a cop turned detective who is looking for action. Pitt's wife, played by Gwyneth Paltrow, makes for a good secondary character who is constantly trying to relate to the two detectives in their search. As the detectives push further to solve the case, the crime scenes become grislier and tensions rise in the corrupt, rainy unnamed city.
There's many great things about Se7en, but one of the best is the opening credits. One might ask how the opening credits can be so great, but it must be seen to be believed. The opening credits consists of many cut together shots of someone, presumably "Jonathan Doe", creating a disturbing notebook of photographs and letters set to music that is barely even music, but rather just creaking. Most of the shots are shaky and overexposed and yet so beautiful. How is it possible that something so beautiful? Only David Fincher could achieve a sequence so effective. The credits set the tone wonderfully through the movie and, if watched very closely, clues to the plot can be unlocked. If anything, the credits are worth a look.
To continue explaining Fincher's greatness, one must explain how he creates the tone of the movie and what he does that makes the viewers feel disturbed by the end of the movie. Although there is almost no violence on-screen, the crime scenes are enough to make people feel sick. Every shot in the movie is very dark and almost hard to understand. There are no shades of bright colors throughout the whole movie. These dark shots, which may remind many viewers of Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight, give the film a very gloomy feel that no other film really does. Combine the shades of black and gray with the gruesome crime scenes and one gets a very dark and creepy movie.
There really is no other way to say it: Se7en is quite an amazing movies. There's some brilliant direction from David Fincher (as per usual) and great performances from the cast. The movie is thrilling and at the same time brutal forcing audience members to wonder whether or not they would like to finish the movie. Roger Ebert once said that a true film buff sees films that nobody else has heard of. I must say that I disagree. To become a true film buff means seeing movies like this and then appreciating and understanding them. It is a movie like Se7en that stands the test of time and is universally regarded as wonderful by movie buffs and everyday movie watchers alike.