Yeah. I needed the money, too.
The Return Of The Seven (1966) is the sequel to The Magnificent Seven (1960), but it has little to offer in comparison to its illustrious predecessor. Another group of bandits are kidnapping the men of some villages, and in the most interesting part of the story, they are laboring to build a church to honor the two sons of the rancher and leader of the bandits, dead & gone, tall and sleek as stallions, as he says.
But we learn later they were not what the bandit leader wanted, for he wanted rough, tough men in his own mold, and they were gentle men, like their mother; the church may be in their name, but in some twisted way, it’s for the bandit leader.
Not much else of thematic interest here. Lots of shooting, people falling off horses (I was actually musing on how terrified a stunt man must be when a horse is falling and he’s still astride it), a few chucking dynamite at the bad guys. Gotta say, no one seems to be able to shoot a gun straight.
Even the actors didn’t really seem to be into it all that much. But then, it was fairly boring.
