Antoine Fuqua Wants to Release His 5-Hour Cut of ‘Magnificent Seven’

What’s with all of these studio filmmakers wanting to release lengthy cuts of their past films? After Zack Snyder and David Ayer, this week sees another director touting his own cut.

Antoine Fuqua released 2016’s "The Magnificent Seven" to lukewarm reviews, the overall consensus was that of an underwhelming remake of a beloved film. It should have never been greenlit.

‘Magnificent Seven’ star Ethan Hawke had previously mentioned about a 5-hour cut of the film and now Fuqua, via IndieWire, is confirming its existence and how he very badly wants to release it:

[Ethan Hawke] saw the very first [cut]. I don’t know where it is now though, with MGM, I’d have to try to get it. I would like to recut it myself, but I don’t know who would pay for it. I’d have to pay for that, somewhere down the line, I might try. But yeah, he saw the very first cut, which I thought was better. You are dealing with the studio and timing and theaters, but you got a business is business. But I wish that one was the version [that was released].

Fuqua added that he felt similarly about his 2003 action movie “Tears of the Sun,”which starred Bruce Willis and Monica Bellucci. “It had much more to it,” he recalls. “It was cut down quite a bit. It became a little more movie star-driven, and that wasn’t the intention. It was more about the people and the events, and then it became obviously shifted. But Bruce Willis is an amazing movie star, and I get it.”

Here’s the hard-nosed truth about director’s cuts: nine times out of ten, a movie that a studio has heavily interfered with is probably not that good to begin with. Of course, there are always exceptions like “Once Upon A Time in America,” “Brazil” and “Blade Runner,” but they’re far and few.

The ‘Magnificent Seven’ remake cast was starry: Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D'Onofrio, Peter Sarsgaard, but the action was relentlessly assaultive, there was severe incoherence to the whole thing.

The classic ‘Seven’ story, which was already heavily inspired by Kurosawa’s “Seven Samurai,” goes that seven gunmen come together to protect a town from marauding thieves that have invaded and taken ownership of it.

I’d rather we forget Fuqua’s "The Magnificent Seven” ever existed. Why remake the much-celebrated original with its pristine Elmer Bernstein score and John Sturges' crisp direction. Sure, Washington had charisma, and Vincent D’Onofrio was Vincent D’Onofrio, but attempting to recreate the excellence of the 1960 original was a lost cause.