MovieChat Forums > Se7en (1995) Discussion > Didn't age well...

Didn't age well...

posted 8 years ago by MacacoBanditi
25 replies | jump to latest

This is another great example of how movies were overdone in the 1990s, just like The Matrix. Massive hits when they came out, but try watching them again in this decade and you will see how silly and pretentious they look.

One example. They tried to make NYC look gloomy and bleak. How did they go about it? Well, it rains all the time and everyone's offices and quarters look like they haven't been tidied up in 10 years. Oh and the lights are really dim everywhere. That's it. Even Mills and his wife, who have JUST MOVED IN are living in a shady messed up dumpster. Compare that with a true ageless masterpiece, Blade Runner. That's a totally believable dystopic Los Angeles.

Another example, the Somerset character. So they tried to make him deep and enigmatic, more or less like Morpheus in The Matrix. Instead they both come off as pseudo-pedantic annoying smart-asses. Take this scene: cab driver:"where are we going?". Somerset: "very far from here". Turns out they were just going to the city library. In real life you would probably get punched in the face. Another scene: Mills wife:"so, how long have you lived here?". Somerset: "faaar too long". Oh, what a mysterious and profound thinker. Yes, and he knows Chaucer and Dante.

Brad Pitt was a terrible actor back then, his character his unbearable and his acting makes it even more so. Did we really need a borderline white trash main character to partner up with the oh-so-wise Somerset? We are supposed to care about him, and suffer with him. Instead the only really satisfying bit of the movie is thatGwyneth Paltrow's head gets chopped off. It should happen more often in movies by the way, as she is the most overrated actress ever.

Anyway, this movie has scholarly value as a study case for everything that was horribly wrong with movies back in the 1990s. Do you want some serious timeless neo-noir gems? Get Blade Runner, Chinatown, Fargo, No Country for Old Men, Memento or The Professional. Se7en (did they really decide to spell it that way?!) will look like high-school project film-making compared to those behemoths of cinema.

[–] chilone (17913) 6 years ago

Yeah, I'm just gonna go ahead and disagree with everything you said. Too much to break down but as far as Somerset goes, who said he was supposed to be Yoda? He was just a wore out, soon to be retired cop who didn't feel like saying much. As far as Pitt goes, I think he played an unbearable character, very well.

[–] MrMovie (900) 6 years ago

Another child trying to troll. Go fuck your dad

[–] Drooch (5333) 5 years ago

Ironically you have the obnoxiousness of Mills. I wonder if you hate the film because it pinpoints and criticises the unwarranted arrogance that you so perfectly characterise.

[–] AP (5288) 5 years ago

I'm surprised that, in three years, no one has brought up the fact that the OP says he hates movies from the 1990's but cites Fargo and The Professional as two of the best movies ever made... which were made in the 90's.

[–] BourbonKing (5778) 5 years ago

1. NYC is not the film's setting and it is intentionally never mentioned

2. Somerset is an aging detective and in a sordid way the antithesis of magic negro detectives like Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon who's getting "too old for this shit", so you missed the character framing with him

3. Mills is suppose to be restless and unconventional just like all hot rookie detectives. He also is a counterpoint to Mel Gibson in Lethal Weapon who may be good looking and fierce but we see how his antics destroy him by the film's end.

4. There was nothing off about the acting by anyone in this film, including boring Gwyneth Paltrow who fit the 90s oeuvre of the damsel in distress.

5. The movies you listed are not even a good contrast to argue why se7en is a bad film. Personally, if I were to cite a movie I thought was overrated and didn't age well it would be The Usual Suspects. It became a victim of its own twist and it trying to watch it again after being spoiled it just wears itself thin.

The lasting effect of Se7en is that its story defied expectations in its resolution. A real downer of a story but it left you thinking how fucked up humanity is. For a Fincher movie I think this one holds up better than Fight Club.

[–] Mensa1856 (135) 2 years ago

Nowhere does it say it takes place in NYC, asshole.