I’m not sure what meaning there is in “remaking” The Magnificent Seven, given that the Seven Samurai template has been such a well-worn plot device in the past 60 years. In a time when The Force Awakens is essentially an uncommented-upon remake of a movie in the same film series, Antoine Fuqua could have delivered nearly the same final cut under a different name and he wouldn’t even need to acknowledge the comparison. It would have made it a little easier to view each component of his film on its own and not in comparison to its 1960 predecessor, but this year’s The Magnificent Seven doesn’t completely suffer for the comparison. Only mostly.

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