movie review 7

A sermon written in blood

It is almost always raining in the city. Somerset, the veteran detective, wears a hat and raincoat. Mills, the kid who has just been transferred into the district, walks bare-headed in the rain as if he'll be young forever. On their first day together, they investigate the death of a fat man they find face-down in a dish of pasta. On a return visit to the scene, the beams of their flashlights point here and there in the filthy apartment, picking out a shelf lined with dozens of cans of Campbell's Tomato Sauce. Not even a fat man buys that much tomato sauce.

This grim death sets the tone for David Fincher's "Seven," one of the darkest and most merciless films ever made in the Hollywood mainstream. It will rain day after day. They will investigate death after death. There are words scrawled at the crime scenes; the fat man's word is on the wall behind his refrigerator: Gluttony. After two of these killings Mills realizes they are dealing with a serial killer, who intends every murder to punish one of the Seven Deadly Sins.

This is as formulaic as an Agatha Christie whodunit. But "Seven" takes place not in the genteel world of country house murders, but in the lives of two cops, one who thinks he has seen it all and the other who has no idea what he is about to see. Nor is the film about detection; the killer turns himself in when the film still has half an hour to go. It's more of a character study, in which the older man becomes a scholar of depravity and the younger experiences it in an pitiable and personal way. A hopeful quote by Hemingway was added as a voice-over after preview audiences found the original ending too horrifying. But the original ending is still there, and the quote plays more like a bleak joke. The film should end with Freeman's "see you around." After the devastating conclusion, the Hemingway line is small consolation.

The enigma of Somerset's character is at the heart of the film, and this is one of Morgan Freeman's best performances. He embodies authority naturally; I can't recall him ever playing a weak man. Here he knows all the lessons a cop might internalize during years spent in what we learn is one of the worst districts of the city. He lives alone, in what looks like a rented apartment, bookshelves on the walls. He puts himself to sleep with a metronome. He never married, although he came close once. He is a lonely man who confronts life with resigned detachment.

When he realizes he's dealing with the Seven Deadly Sins, he does what few people would do, and goes to the library. There he looks into Dante's Inferno , Milton's Paradise Lost and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. It's not that he reads them so much as that he references them for viewers; it is often effective in a horror film to introduce disturbing elements from literature as atmosphere, and Fincher provides glimpses of Gustav Dore's illustrations for Dante, including the famous depiction of a woman with spider legs. Somerset sounds erudite as he names the deadly sins to Mills, who seems to be hearing of them for the first time.

What's being used here is the same sort of approach William Friedkin employed in " The Exorcist " and Jonathan Demme in " The Silence of the Lambs ." What could become a routine cop movie is elevated by the evocation of dread mythology and symbolism. "Seven" is not really a very deep or profound film, but it provides the convincing illusion of one. Almost all mainstream thrillers seek first to provide entertainment; this one intends to fascinate and appall. By giving the impression of scholarship, Detective Somerset lends a depth and significance to what the killer apparently considers moral statements. To be sure, Somerset lucks out in finding that the killer has a library card, although with this killer, thinking back, you figure he didn't get his ideas in the library, and checked out those books to lure the police.

The five murders investigated by the partners provide variety. The killer has obviously gone to elaborate pains in planning and carrying them out -- in one case, at least a year in advance. His agenda in the film's climactic scene, however, must have been improvised recently. "Seven" draws us relentlessly into its horrors, some of which are all the more effective for being glimpsed in brief shots. We can only be sure of the killing methods after the cops discuss them--although a shot of the contents of a plastic bag after an autopsy hardly requires more explanation. Fincher shows us enough to disgust us, and cuts away.

The killer obviously intends his elaborate murders as moral statement. He suggests as much after we meet him. When he's told his crimes will soon be forgotten in the daily rush of cruelty, he insists they will be remembered forever. They are his masterpiece. What goes unexplained is how, exactly, he is making a statement. His victims, presumably guilty of their sins, have been convicted and executed by his actions. What's the lesson? Let that be a warning to us?

Somerset and Mills represent established fiction formulas. Mills is the fish out of water, they're an Odd Couple, and together they're the old hand and the greenhorn. The actors and the dialogue by Andrew Kevin Walker enrich the formulas with specific details and Freeman's precise, laconic speech. Brad Pitt seems more one-dimensional, or perhaps guarded; he's a hothead, quick to dismiss Freeman's caution and experience. It is his wife Tracy ( Gwyneth Paltrow ) who brings a note of humanity into the picture; we never find out very much about her, but we know she loves her husband and worries about him, and she has good instincts when she invites the never-married Somerset over for dinner. Best to make an ally of the man who her husband needs and can learn from. Watching the film, we assume the Tracy character is simply a place-holder, labeled Protagonist's Wife and denied much dimension. But she is saving her impact until later. Thinking back through the film, our appreciation for its construction grows.

The killer, as I said, turns himself in with 30 minutes to go, and dominates the film from that point forward. When "Seven" was released in 1995 the ads, posters and opening credits didn't mention the name of the actor, and although you may well know it, I don't think I will either. This actor has a big assignment. He embodies Evil. Like Hannibal Lecter, his character must be played by a strong actor who projects not merely villainy but twisted psychological complexities. Observe his face. Smug. Self-satisfied. Listen to his voice. Intelligent. Analytical. Mark his composure and apparent fearlessness. The film essentially depends on him, and would go astray if the actor faltered. He doesn't.

"Seven" (1995) was David Fincher's second feature, after "Alien 3" ( 1992 ), filmed when he was only 29. Still to come were such as " Zodiac " (2007) and " The Social Network " (2010). In his work he likes a saturated palate and gravitates toward sombre colors and underlighted interiors. None of his films is darker than this one. Like Spielberg, he infuses the air in his interiors with a fine unseen powder that makes the beams of flashlights visible, emphasizing the surrounding darkness. I don't know why the interior lights in "Seven" so often seem weak or absent, but I'm not complaining. I remember a shot in Murnau's " Faust " (1926) in which Satan wore a black cloak that enveloped a tiny village below. That is the sensation Fincher creates here.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

Morgan Freeman as Somerset
Gwyneth Paltrow as Tracy
Brad Pitt as Mills
Richard Roundtree as Talbot
Andrew Kevin Walker

Directed by

David Fincher

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Seven Reviews

Se7en is a grisly murder thriller, with an intriguing discourse surrounding the symbolism of the murders and Freeman and Pitt as a strong lead duo.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 8, 2024

A stone cold classic, especially from a technical point of view. It's incredibly moody, cements a number of tropes for serial killer/crime texts, and (despite the presence of Spacey), John Doe and that finale are iconic.

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Jul 23, 2024

When Seven, with its velvety world of bottomless evil, taps you on the shoulder, your instinct will be to dive under the theater seat.

Full Review | Mar 29, 2024

I wouldn't go so far as to call David Fincher's Seven the most terrifying film ever, but it's right up there on the top shelf with Psycho and The Silence of the Lambs.

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Mar 29, 2024

Seven doesn't take you to hell and back; it takes you to hell and keeps you there, looking around and wondering how it had come to this.

Full Review | Original Score: A- | Mar 29, 2024

There is no denying that Seven is a deeply unpleasant movie. But I believe it is a fine one, too. It doesn't glory in its depravity, but keeps a distance from it.

All the literary allusions and cinema school self-consciousness can't save Fincher from drowning in the tawdry waste of this dreadful, brutal, abusive movie. Go, our little moviemaker, and sin no more.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4 | Mar 29, 2024

The performance that eventually emerges from the shadows gives both Anthony Hopkins and Anthony Perkins a run for their money. By the end of the film you'll run to your car and lock the doors.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Mar 29, 2024

There's a great deal of talent on display in the serial-killer thriller Seven, which only makes it worse when you finally recognize this is a heartless, soulless, pointless exercise in audience manipulation.

Full Review | Original Score: 1.5/4 | Mar 29, 2024

The results of the killings are needlessly grotesque and don't really serve the smart screenplay by Andrew Kevin Walker and the artful direction of David Fincher. All of this talent is worth seeing if you can look past the gruesome details.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Mar 29, 2024

Seven, a dark, grisly, horrifying and intelligent thriller, may be too disturbing for many people, I imagine, although if you can bear to watch it, you will see filmmaking of a high order.

A spectacular piece of cinema -- a vision of evil triumphant, distilled into deadly psychic poison by a world that is itself corrupt and fallen. After Alien 3, Fincher shows himself a real artist of the medium.

I do not expect to see many better pictures in 1996... Seven is a dazzling movie and it engages the mind while jabbing the solar plexus.

It's a case where a traditional but nicely twisted plot is married smartly to MTV visuals, to the uncommon advantage of them both.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 29, 2024

Fincher's one previous film, Alien 3, shared the same dingy colours and downbeat mood. But where that film stumbled over its tedious plot, Seven almost dances with vitality.

Seven is gripping and intricate in a sordid way, and Freeman and Pitt, physical and spiritual opposites, become an oddly satisfying pair, but I was happy when the movie had played its last trick on me and could hold me no longer.

Did anyone else believe that MTV-video veteran David Fincher ruined his feature film career when it started?... Apparently not the honchos at New Line Cinema, who handed Fincher an interesting, grisly idea for a movie, then allowed him to bury it.

Full Review | Original Score: C- | Mar 29, 2024

Each actor reaches deep and brings forth a character far greater than the one written; for all its disappointments, the film can pierce the heart. As for Fincher, he pierces the heart with genius.

A murky, sometimes disturbing rehash of The Silence of the Lambs genre whose studied obscurity, formulaic thrills, and mannered disgust don't quite conceal its loose ends and predictable plot twists.

It's a scary piece of work.

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Parents' guide to.

Common Sense Says
Parents Say 23 Reviews
Kids Say 68 Reviews

Common Sense Media Review

By Elliot Panek , based on child development research. How do we rate?

Grim, slick, shocking thriller. Older teens only.

Parents Need to Know

Why Age 17+?

The gory aftermath (and allusions to) horrific torture and murder. Gunshots. Off

Lots of swearing.

References to prostitution, sex.

Any Positive Content?

Though justice is said to be "worth fighting for," the world is so bleak and ful

Though Seven aims to show that all people are capable of great sin, Det

Parents need to know that this film contains graphic depictions of the aftermath of grisly murders involving the seven deadly sins. While none of this takes place on-screen, the vivid descriptions prove to be nearly as chilling. For example, an obese man is forced to eat until his stomach bursts. A man is forced to kill a prostitute by stabbing her reproductive organs with an 8-inch knife. A beauty queen's face is cut off. A lawyer must cut out his own stomach. A police officer's pregnant wife is beheaded. In the end, the line between good and evil is blurred, with evil more or less coming out on top.

To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Violence & Scariness

The gory aftermath (and allusions to) horrific torture and murder. Gunshots. Off-screen murder. Rape.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Positive Messages

Though justice is said to be "worth fighting for," the world is so bleak and full of horror that this doesn't seem believable.

Positive Role Models

Though Seven aims to show that all people are capable of great sin, Detective Somerset is level-headed, wise, and kind.

Where to Watch

Videos and photos.

Parent and Kid Reviews

Parents say (23)
Kids say (68)

Based on 23 parent reviews

"What's in the box?!"

Become vengeance, david, become wrath., what's the story.

SEVEN combines horror and film noir genres, with overconfident rookie David Mills ( Brad Pitt ) as the doomed detective of the noir tradition, and book veteran William Somerset ( Morgan Freeman ) as the desexualized, pedantic survivor familiar to slasher movie fans. The story follows the archetypal pair as they wind their way through a dark world of urban violence in search of a serial killer ( Kevin Spacey ). Mills and Somerset conclude that each murder corresponds to one of the seven deadly sins from the Bible, and that the killer is trying to preach his message of religious morality through his murders and the press they receive. Even after being willfully apprehended, the killer has one final trick up his sleeve -- a horrific gesture designed to goad Mills into crossing the line between lawful justice and sinful vengeance.

Is It Any Good?

Dark, disturbing and occasionally gory, Seven is a psychological thriller that, along with Chinatown , is among the bleakest films in mainstream cinema history.

The murders are not shown on screen, but the film has a morbid fascination with the pain inflicted on the victims. And it depicts a dark universe, where the lines between good and evil are blurred. There's no question that it aims to be more philosophical than other detective/horror films (namely The Silence of the Lambs ). Attempts at deeper meaning might be pretentious or profound, depending on how serious you can take Brad Pitt as an actor.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about horror movies. How is this movie different than a slasher film? What makes it disturbing? Is it any less chilling because the violence is not shown on screen?

Movie Details

In theaters : January 1, 1995
On DVD or streaming : June 7, 2001
Cast : Brad Pitt , Gwyneth Paltrow , Morgan Freeman
Director : David Fincher
Inclusion Information : Female actors, Black actors
Studio : Warner Bros.
Genre : Drama
Run time : 127 minutes
MPAA rating : R
MPAA explanation : grisly afterviews of horrific and bizarre killings, and for strong language.
Last updated : February 28, 2022

Did we miss something on diversity?

Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.

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What to watch next.

The Silence of the Lambs

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