Why “Seven” (1995) will Always Remain the Ultimate Crime Thriller

Why “Se7en” (1995) will Always Remain the Ultimate Crime Thriller

By Ahmed Ayan Arsalan

4 Min Read

Posted: September 2, 2023

Film: Seven (1995)

Director: David Fincher

Written by: Andrew Kevin Walker

Release Date: September 22, 1995

Runtime: 126 minutes

Thrillers are a hard-to-master genre in film-making. But if you, by any chance, are David Fincher, Martin Scorsese, Christopher Nolan, or Quentin Tarantino, then there is no such thing as “hard to master”. You can tell that for a fact since I am reviewing “Seven”, an age old film.

You can never go wrong with a David Fincher production. One of the main aspects that make Fincher’s films unique and distinguishable from the rest is the color palette he uses. He once said,

“In film, we sculpt time, we sculpt behaviour and we sculpt light.”

Unless you’ve never been in love before, his monochromatically dressed color palette will make any observer fall in love once more. No one can disagree to this.

The Ultimate Review

The Setting

“Seven” stars two of the most astounding actors, Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman as David Mills and William Somerset respectively. Both of the characters are detectives who reside in a gloomy earlier New York where there was not a day the sun shined through. The detectives are entrusted with locating and prosecuting a murderer who carried out planned killings in a manner that exemplified the seven deadly sins; greed, gluttony, pride, lust, wrath, envy, and sloth.

The Beauty

Each murder reveals a different hue in the movie that corresponds to the type of sin that the murderer was trying to depict. If the sin of Gluttony was shown, Fischer would fill you into an environment where It accurately felt like the sin would have been committed. It felt as if i just dissolved into the environment at some point into the movie without even noticing it (basically in the first 5 minutes).

Your eyes won’t leave the screen for even a millisecond thanks to Fincher. He creates his environment so masterfully and adds just the right amount of lighting for the film-making and plot to be at its most elegant. Because the scenes are so intricately constructed, the movie never makes you want to watch a Subway Surfers video.

The Development

Transition from one moral being to another in the same soul and body is as smooth as silk in “Seven”. It appears as though the characters you saw two hours earlier were never who they are two hours later due to the absolute perfection with which David Fincher executes the character growth in this movie.

“Seven” shows a rather different way of character development. The film shows us how one detective takes on the personality of the other detective and vice versa. Just thinking about it even now makes chills go down my spine. What a beautiful film.

The Peak

“Seven” is incredibly suspenseful and graphic (so be aware). There are also parts where it’s just a little side story of detective Mills’ wife who’s pregnant but hasn’t told him yet. It may seem a bit odd to place a family matter in the storyline but the key reason this film doesn’t succeed in making viewers forget it is the way this side story connects to the main plot and explodes you with its climax. You will surely shed a tear of elegance at the end of this 126 minutes of composition.

Too Long, Didn’t Read

“Seven” delivers all the blows an ultimate crime thriller should hit you with. From the absolutely perfect paced adventures to the verge of character development, there is no fault i saw in this movie and neither will you find any. It was as if I was Garfield and the film was the lasagna. If you’re truly willing to watch a film that you will be talking about for ages to come, remember, David Fincher has got you covered with the ultimate crime thriller.