'The Magnificent Seven' is directed by Antoine Fuqua who is best known for his work with 'Training Day' and 'The Equalizer'. 'The Magnificent Seven' stars Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D'Onofrio, and Byung Hung-Lee as five of the seven. Notice how I say, "five of the seven", well that's because all of the characters' names are forgettable as are the characters themselves. This is where 'Magnificent Seven' fails to reel you into this story of revenge and seeking righteousness. As you may have expected, Denzel plays himself, Pratt plays himself, Hawke might be the only character with any depth but his performance brought nothing to the table. In a film like this, beautifully crafted characters are important to your story. If you don't have interesting characters in a revenge tale then your film will probably be of lesser quality, see 'The Revenant' for another example of this. That is why a film like 'Kill Bill' excels and is regarded as being the best revenge film of all-time. The Bride is a beautifully crafted character, the story of which she is in is thrilling and exciting, plus the action and character interactions are meaty and special. Where the film does do well is in the action scenes, the cinematography, score, and character interactions. While the humor does feel quite stale throughout, the characters themselves seem to have some unique string tying them all together through past events and meetings. This is where the writing finally felt authentic for these characters and I wish we got more insight to their past relationships between each other. While I believe Fuqua is the most overrated talent in the business, he does know how to handle action. If I could only try and sell the film to you in one sentence I would say,"Go see this film for the finale alone!" I cannot stress enough how beautifully handled this scene is. You hear every neigh from a horse, ever bullet whizz past your ear, every explosion erupt inside your head and it bodes for one of the most thrilling sequences of the year. It is choreographed so beautifully and amid all the havoc you can see everything that is going on. 'The Magnificent Seven' also provides one of the most memorable and exciting scores of the year. It has the western twang to it but has a modern day twist to it as well and I loved that. James Horner is a master in this department. Having not seen the 1960's American classic or the original Japanese film that this is all based off, 'Seven Samurai', I think my personal opinion is as fresh as can be. Without an prior knowledge to how this story might have played out seeing it with the freshest eyes possible was quite the experience. Despite the dangerously weak story and forgettable characters, 'The Magnificent Seven' is quite fun. There are some scenes sprinkled throughout that will thrill and the character interactions are quite enjoyable. Had I actually been given the chance to care more about this group of seven guys I may have really liked this film instead of just kind of enjoying it. 'The Magnificent Seven' gets a 6.8/10