Seven (1995 film)

Seven (often stylized as Se7en) is a 1995 American crime thriller film directed by David Fincher and written by Andrew Kevin Walker. It stars Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman, with Gwyneth Paltrow and John C. McGinley in supporting roles. Set in an unnamed, crime-ridden city, Seven's narrative follows disenchanted, nearly retired Detective Lieutenant William Somerset (Freeman) and his newly transferred partner David Mills (Pitt) as they try to stop a serial killer from committing a series of murders based on the seven deadly sins.

Walker, an aspiring writer, based Seven on his experiences of moving from a suburban setting to New York City during a period of rising crime and drug addiction in the late 1980s. An Italian film company optioned his script, but following financial difficulties, the rights were sold to New Line Cinema. Studio executives were opposed to the script's bleak conclusion, insisting on a more mainstream and optimistic outcome. Fincher, determined to re-establish himself after a career setback with his directorial debut Alien 3 (1992), was mistakenly sent Walker's original script and, convinced of its merit, committed to directing the project if the original ending remained intact. Principal photography took place in Los Angeles between December 1994 and March 1995, on a $33–$34 million budget.

Seven garnered middling test audience results and was not predicted to perform well due to its violent and mature content. However, it grossed $327.3 million worldwide, becoming a sleeper hit and the seventh highest-grossing film of the year. Contemporaneous reviews were generally positive, praising the performances of the central cast and the ending. Seven revitalized Fincher's career and helped Pitt move from roles based on his appearance to more serious, dramatic roles.

In the years since its release, the critical reception has been more positive. The film has inspired a number of TV series and films with its aesthetic, music, and premise. Its title sequence, which depicts the killer preparing for his actions in the film, is considered an important design innovation that sparked a renewed interest in title design, while the film's twist ending has been named as one of the most shocking and unforgettable in cinematic history.

In an unnamed city overcome with violent crime and corruption, disillusioned police Detective Lieutenant William Somerset is one week from retirement. He is partnered with David Mills, a young, short-tempered, idealistic detective who recently relocated to the city with his wife, Tracy.

On Monday, Somerset and Mills investigate an obese man who was forced to eat until his stomach burst, killing him. The detectives find the word "gluttony" written on a wall. Somerset, considering the case too extreme for his last investigation, asks to be reassigned, but his request is denied. The following day, another victim, who had been forced to cut one pound (0.45 kg) of flesh from his body, is found; the crime scene is marked "greed." Clues at the scene lead Somerset and Mills to the sloth victim, a drug-dealing pederast whom they find emaciated and restrained to a bed. Photographs reveal the victim was restrained for precisely one year. Somerset surmises the murders are based on the Christian concept of the seven deadly sins.

Tracy invites Somerset to share supper with her and Mills, helping the detectives overcome their mutual hostility. On Friday, Tracy meets privately with Somerset because she has no other acquaintances in the city. She reveals her unhappiness at moving there, especially after learning she is pregnant, and believes the city is an unfit place to raise a child. Somerset sympathizes with Tracy, having persuaded his former girlfriend to abort their child for similar reasons and regretting it ever since. He advises Tracy to inform Mills only if she intends to keep the child.

A remark by Mills inspires Somerset to research libraries for anyone checking out books based on the seven deadly sins, leading the pair to a man only known as John Doe's apartment. Unexpectedly, Doe returns home and is pursued by Mills. Doe incapacitates him by striking him with a tire iron and holds him at gunpoint, but chooses to leave him alive and flees. The police investigate Doe's apartment, finding a large amount of cash, hundreds of Doe's notebooks, and photographs of some of his victims; the cache includes images of Somerset and Mills by a person they believed was an intrusive journalist at the sloth crime scene. Doe calls the apartment and speaks of his admiration for Mills.

On Saturday, Somerset and Mills investigate the fourth victim, lust, a prostitute who had been raped with a custom-made, bladed strap-on by a man held at gunpoint. The following day, the pride victim is found: a model whom Doe facially disfigured. Unable to live without her beauty, she committed suicide.

As Somerset and Mills return to the police station, Doe arrives covered in blood and surrenders himself. He threatens to plead insanity at his trial, potentially escaping punishment, unless Mills and Somerset escort him to an undisclosed location where they will find the envy and wrath victims. During the drive, Doe says he believes God has chosen him to send a message about the ubiquity of, and apathy toward, sin. Doe has no remorse for his victims, believing the shocking murders will force society to pay attention to him.

Doe leads the detectives to a remote location far outside city limits, where a delivery van approaches. Somerset intercepts the vehicle, whose driver was instructed to deliver a package to Mills at this specific time and location. He is horrified at the package's contents and tells Mills to put down his gun.

Doe reveals he himself represents envy because he envied Mills's life with Tracy and implies the package contains her severed head. He urges Mills to become wrath, telling him Tracy begged for her life and that of her unborn child, and takes pleasure in realizing Mills was unaware of the pregnancy. Despite Somerset's pleas, Mills, distraught and enraged, shoots Doe dead, completing Doe's plan. Police remove the catatonic Mills, and Somerset tells his captain he will "be around." Somerset says in voiceover: "Ernest Hemingway once wrote: 'The world is a fine place, and worth fighting for.' I agree with the second part."

Seven also features Julie Araskog as Mrs. Gould, John Cassini as Officer Davis, Reg E. Cathey as Doctor Santiago, Peter Crombie as Doctor O'Neil, Richard Portnow as Doctor Beardsley, Richard Schiff as Mark Swarr, and Mark Boone Junior as a "greasy FBI man". Hawthorne James appears as George the library night guard, Michael Massee portrays "man in massage parlor booth", Leland Orser plays "crazed man in massage parlor", Pamala Tyson portrays a thin vagrant outside Doe's apartment, and Richmond Arquette plays Doe's delivery man.

Doe's victims include: Bob Mack as gluttony, a morbidly obese man who is force-fed until his stomach bursts; Gene Borkan as greed victim Eli Gould, a criminal attorney who is forced to cut off his own flesh; and Michael Reid MacKay as the sloth victim Theodore "Victor" Allen, a drug dealer and child abuser. Cat Mueller portrays the lust victim, a sex worker who is impaled with a bladed sex toy, and Heidi Schanz appears as model Rachel Slade, pride, whom Doe disfigures. Writer Andrew Kevin Walker makes a cameo appearance as a corpse Somerset investigates during the film's opening scene; Morgan Freeman's son Alfonso appears as a fingerprint technician; and columnist George Christy portrays the police department janitor scraping Somerset's name from his door.

In 1986, aspiring screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker moved from the suburbs of Pennsylvania to New York City, and described the culture shock of living in a city undergoing significant rises in crime and drug abuse. While working as a sales assistant for Tower Records in 1991, Walker began writing a spec script called Seven, which is set in an unnamed, bleak and gloomy city that was inspired by his "depressing" time in New York. Walker said: "it's true that if I hadn't lived there I probably wouldn't have written Seven ... " Film studios were eager for high concept spec scripts—simple and succinct ideas that could be easily sold to audiences. Walker believed his thriller about police officers pursuing a serial killer driven by the seven deadly sins would attract attention and help begin a professional writing career.

Walker intended to leave the script's narrative open to interpretation to avoid invalidating the opinions of the prospective audience. He wanted to defy audience expectations, and leave them feeling "violated and exhausted" by the conclusion. According to Walker, "there's lots of evil out there, and you're not always going to get the satisfaction of having any sort of understanding of why that is. That's one of the things that scares people the most about serial killers". To shape the character of the killer, Walker drew inspiration from his own experiences navigating city streets, where he witnessed crimes and sins unfolding openly. This exploration led him to contemplate the idea of an individual who deliberately fixated on these sins. He had Doe surrender himself to the police because it would rob the audience and characters of the anticipated satisfaction, opting instead to leave them in discomfort leading up to the finale.

In the early 1990s, Italian company Penta Film [it], under manager Phyllis Carlyle, optioned the script. Walker received the minimum fee permitted by the Writers Guild of America (WGA), which proved sufficient to quit his job, relocate to Los Angeles, and dedicate himself to working on Seven.

To lead the project, Penta Film hired director Jeremiah S. Chechik, known for his recent success directing the comedy film National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) and seeking a more serious project. Chechik and Penta Film insisted on several script changes, including the removal of the bleak conclusion, in which Tracy's severed head is delivered in a box. Facing the ultimatum of complying with these requests or risking replacement or project cancellation, Walker acquiesced and wrote a more-mainstream ending in which the detectives confront Doe in a church described as either on fire or burned out. In this revised script, Doe embodies the sin of envy and kills Mills before being shot dead by Somerset, while a pregnant Tracy leaves the city. In a 2017 interview, Walker said he felt he was ruining his script and should have left the project. To meet the studio's demands, Walker wrote a total of thirteen drafts.