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By Brian Prisco | Posted Under Trade News | Comments (13)

the-magnificent-seven-1-800.jpg

If you’re going to do a remake, if you’re gonna take it upon yourself to reimagine a classic, then goddammit, you best reinvent it. The Magnificent Seven itself is a remake of Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, but takes a wonderful film and doesn’t try to recreate it, but honors it by reinventing it. And so, when I heard from that magnificent bastard over at FilmDrunk that Irvine Welsh was planning to redo The Magnificent Seven, I thought, well alright then. At least it’s gonna be creatively fucked up. Maybe the Wild Bunch on heroin?

Then I read his concept:

“Welsh will direct gritty UK comedy The Magnificent Eleven, a modern-day version of the classic 1960 western The Magnificent Seven in which the Cowboys are a local amateur soccer team, the Indians run a nearby Tandoori restaurant and the bandits are a group of menacing thugs run by a maniac called Blonde Bob. The film is set to star Sean Bean, Dougray Scott and Robert Vaughan, the veteran actor who is the last surviving cast member from the original Magnificent Seven.”

What the fuck? I don’t…I can’t even….guheh?

It reads like something Guy Ritchie would have hatched back before he hitched his wagon to the Lucky Star. Irvine Welsh reads like someone crushed up hallucinogens in a Slurpee filled with seven different flavors, then made you take hits through your nostril. The concept alone is fit to set off seizures. And even if it’s a spectacular failure, at least it’s interesting. It’s not just assembling seven somewhat western looking fellas and have them pull off a gunfight. This is mindwaffling.

Welsh’s actually got one directing credit under his belt — some kind of direct to DVD crap — but I still think this will be worth catching.









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Comments

You know he can make this film all he wants, but it won't be The Magnificent Anything and Robert Vaughn must really need some money.

Posted by: PaddyDog at February 17, 2010 11:15 AM

Djimon Hounsou has just been cast as fullback Cayman Lazuli, inventor of the Lamdba Zone Defense.

Posted by: laredo at February 17, 2010 11:19 AM

I still think this will be worth catching.

Is that your idea of a punchline, Prisco?

You've presented us with a description of YET ANOTHER off-the-rack forgettable Brit "comedy" in the spirit of Brassed Off and Blow Dry and all that other awful shite that got made because The Full Monty was a hit.

To even mention Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai in the same breath as this concept is both baffling and a little bit obscene.

Posted by: Jerce at February 17, 2010 11:28 AM

I'm glad for anything Mr. Welsh does.

Posted by: Cindy at February 17, 2010 11:32 AM

Sean Bean in a gritty UK comedy? Yes and very yes. The man does wrong so right.

Posted by: ThunderSacTriumph at February 17, 2010 11:46 AM

As a McQueen fan, I just died a little inside..

Posted by: Magiel at February 17, 2010 11:52 AM

Jerce, as a tuba player I have to take offense at your derision of Brassed Off, if only because that cheesy-ass movie made so many brass musicians so happy. The Grimethorpe Colliery band did a spectacular soundtrack and Pete Postlethwaite could conduct my band any day!

And I would otherwise ignore this completely but I am on board with ThunderSacTriumph and I will see it just to see Sean Bean, thankyouverymuch. If it doesn't suck, that's just a bonus.

Posted by: Anne (in Reno) at February 17, 2010 12:13 PM

NO. No no no. Please leave my favorites alone, you dirty welsh people. Stick to Torchwood and stay away from my childhood. The Seven Samurai was beautiful. The Magnificent Seven was badass. You can't do anything else. More beauty or badassery would suck. Humor, cartoons, romance, or tearjerkiness would blow.

Leave it alone or I will construct a thirty foot long paper mache human centipede, fly it over there, and make it do unspeakable things to all of you.

Posted by: esme at February 17, 2010 1:22 PM

Jerce:

THANK YOU! I am so sick of people who think every quirky comedy that's set in a down-on-its-luck former mining town and features regional accents must, by definition, be hilarious and clever. Most of them are absolute crap.

Posted by: PaddyDog at February 17, 2010 3:29 PM

So....He's giving The Magnificent Seven the same treatment the Coen brothers did to The Odyssey? Cause that's what I get from this.

Posted by: alphawhiskey at February 17, 2010 4:19 PM

I'm with Jerce and Paddydog...the 90s are over, and the whole concept of "oddball Brits getting into gritty but humorous situations" is about as done as Matrix-style bullet time was when TGI Fridays started using it in their ads.

Best thing to come out of that genre was that Jason Statham was discovered then freed to become our era's Chuck Norris and make wonderfully ridiculous action flicks.

And WTF Robert Vaughan?! What a career trajectory...movies with McQueen, television spy, A-team puppetmaster, and now this. Sigh.

Posted by: Jacktrade at February 17, 2010 7:00 PM

Thus far I've seen all versions of Seven Samurai that I'm aware of: the original Japanese, the Western and the more recent anime Samurai 7.

Loved 'em all. I dunno about this one....Hollywood's effed up too many classics for me to be optimistic.

Posted by: Four Eyes at February 17, 2010 11:20 PM

Normally I just lurk around and read the articles but Prisco's sacrilege at referring to The Acid House (Irvine Welsh's directorial credit) as "crap" cannot go unmentioned. I suggest watching it before judging... hell I just suggest watching it because it's pretty damn great.

Posted by: joemama420 at February 19, 2010 9:51 AM