Thrill Seeker: SE7EN

 by Sonia Mansfield

Sonia won’t tell you what’s in the box.

Seven
Starring Morgan Freeman, Brad Pitt, and Gwyneth Paltrow
Written by Andrew Kevin Walker
Directed by David Fincher
Rated R for gluttony, greed, sloth, envy, wrath, pride, and lust. Also, murder, lots and lots of murder

Welcome to Thrill Seeker, in which I watch thrillers from the '80s and '90s. In the spirit of Scary Movie Month, I leaned into the horror genre with this month’s thriller and picked Seven, starring Morgan Freeman, Brad Pitt, and Gwyneth Paltrow.

Seven played at the theater where I worked, so I saw it many times back in the day. Like a lot of women in 1995, I was all-in on Brad Pitt. Ever since I saw Thelma & Louise, I believed he might be the hottest man alive. So much so that I paid money to see Cool World.

Now I have very mixed feelings about Brad Pitt because reasons. He still makes movies I want to see, and he’s good in them, but I’m not happy about it, if that makes sense. He’s not enough to get me to watch a movie. I’ll see The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth because I loved Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and it’s directed by David Fincher, but I don’t feel the need to see the movie he made with a dog.

ANYWAY, enough about Brad Pitt.

Let’s run through the plot, no spoilers, because believe it or not, there are people who haven’t seen Seven.

The plot: Det. William Somerset (Morgan Freeman) is one week from retirement, and not in a funny “I’m getting too old for this shit” way. He’s disillusioned with the city he’s been working in, and he says he doesn’t understand it anymore. His replacement is Det. David Mills (Pitt), who 100% thinks he’s in a buddy cop movie at first. He’s all ego and one-liners that he thinks are clever. “Ladies and gentlemen, we have a homicide." Mills definitely watched 21 Jump Street as a teenager. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Their first case is an obese man who has been forced to eat until he died. It’s some nasty shit, but somewhere in a dark movie theater an executive from Olive Garden was inspired to create the never-ending pasta bowl.

Somerset and Mills immediately clash over how to handle the case, and they break up for a bit.

Mills catches a new case: a prominent defense lawyer is found dead after being forced to cut off a pound of his own flesh, with the word "GREED" written in his blood. Meanwhile, as he continues his work on the obese man case, the ever-observant Somerset notices a clue pointing to gluttony.

Because Somerset is smart, he realizes the killer is working through the seven deadly sins, and the detectives now know there will be five more victims. So, Somerset spends his evening reading everything he can about the seven deadly sins in the library. Cut to Mills getting pissed just trying to read The Seven Deadly Sins for Dummies. Nowadays, they’d just Google or DuckDuckGo that shit. “Alexa, tell me about the seven deadly sins.” I have a feeling Somerset would still go to the library.

These two very different detectives have to work together, and their styles clash with every decision. Somerset is patient and thoughtful. This is a puzzle to be solved. Mills is impulsive and eager. He’s quick to kick in doors and draw his gun. I bet he watched a lot of Miami Vice as a teenager, too. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Hoping to improve their working relationship, Mills’ lovely wife Tracy (Gwyneth Paltrow) invites Somerset over for dinner. It’s such a great scene, and Paltrow is so good in it. She softens both of them, and for the first (and maybe only) time in the movie, Mills and Somerset actually smile and laugh.

After dinner, Mills pours Somerset the world’s biggest glass of wine, and they get to work on the case because the murderer still has sloth, pride, lust, envy, and wrath to go.

Seriously, that's a hefty pour

And here’s where my plot summary ends, thrill seekers. Just know there are more murders, a lot of rain, and a very special delivery.

Is it a thrill? Yes! Fincher pulls off a neat trick here. The movie is gruesome, but you never actually see the murders take place. The violence is implied, but you see the aftermath (and it’s so gross). The movie makes it so easy to imagine the murders that you kinda scare yourself. This movie still horrifies me.

Let’s talk about David Fincher for a minute. David Fincher has made a few of my favorite movies: Gone Girl and Zodiac. But I'm still not sure I'd call him “one of my guys.” Mainly because I hated The Curious Case of Benjamin Button so much, and I couldn’t even be bothered with Mank or The Killer. Still, I was kinda obsessed with Seven in 1995. I loved the look of it. It’s forever raining, and the color is drained. Everything looks soaked and grimy. To me, it looks like how despair feels.

And Morgan Freeman is sooooo great in this. This could’ve been such a lazy performance. We all know the cop-who-takes-one-more-case-before-retirement trope. Instead, Somerset is weary and weighed down by all the darkness he’s seen. He should’ve been nominated for Best Actor, but I guess we’ll all have to settle for Seven totally cleaning up at the MTV Movie Awards, including Best Movie, Most Desirable Male (Pitt, not Freeman), and Best Villain, which is a spoiler for the movie. You gotta love that it was nominated for Best On-Screen Duo, but lost to Chris Farley and David Spade for Tommy Boy. *Chandler Bing voice* Could these things be any more different?

Anyway, the ending of Seven is … damn. Again, no spoilers. It’s a meme now, but in 1995, it was a punch in the gut. I remember the audience FREAKED OUT in the theater. Someone yelled, “OH MY GOD!” and someone else shrieked, “Nooooo!” And I love a thriller that fuckin’ goes for it.

Rating: 5 out of 5 bunnies in a boiling pot