When an amazed Chico compliments him on his long-distance shot, an irritated Britt tells him that it was "the worst. However, Chico ruins the plan by shooting one of the banditos, forcing Britt to kill the second and third men, who were fast escaping on horseback. Soon after, Chris learns that three of Calvera's men are nearby and sends Britt and Lee to bring the men back alive. The next day, the seven attend a town celebration and notice that all the village women are missing. When they are greeted with silence as they enter the village, Chris accepts the villagers' fearful reluctance, but Chico angrily rages at them for their cowardice. Days later, as the delegation, joined by the six gunslingers, rides toward Ixcatlan, they notice Chico following and Chris, softened by the young man's resolve, finally motions for him to join them. Soon after Britt joins the group, the well-dressed but destitute Lee offers his services in attempt to regain his nerve, which he has lost while on the run from his enemies. At a bar that night, an enraged Chico holds Chris at gunpoint and orders him to draw, but Chris quietly refuses the challenge until the boy collapses from drunkenness. The next day, Chris watches as expert knife-thrower and gunslinger Britt easily wins a draw with a deadly knife throw and considers him for the team. Soon after, jovial gold hunter Harry Luck, assuming that there must be some hidden treasure which the other gunslingers will split, joins the team, as well as Vin and the brawny war veteran O'Reilly. As word spreads, young, impetuous Chico, inspired by Vin and Chris's triumphant carriage ride, asks for the job, but is humiliated when he fails Chris's test to determine if Chico is a quick draw. Chris instead offers to round up a team of gunmen, even though the villagers can only afford to pay $20 pay for six weeks' work. After witnessing Chris and Vin easily outdraw the angered townsmen as they make their way to the graveyard, the delegation asks Chris to buy guns for them, explaining that the Mexican rurales cannot guard the village from Calvera's repeated plundering. When the three-man delegation from Ixcatlan led by Hilario arrives at a border town to buy guns, they are awed by gunslingers Chris and Vin, who offer to drive a carriage carrying the body of an Indian through town when the funeral director refuses to transport it for fear of the bigoted citizens' reprisals. After the banditos leave, the villagers, barely able to survive on what remains but unable to fight the banditos, seek the advice of the old man, a village elder, who tells them to buys guns at the border and learn how to use them. Fast, accurate and deadly with a knife, Coburn has almost no lines yet his character is one of the most memorable of the film.When ruthless bandit leader Calvera and his forty men raid the Mexican village of Ixcatlan for food and goods, the villagers, used to Calvera's harvest-time plundering, keep quiet with the exception of one outraged farmer, whom Calvera summarily shoots. The individual performances are iconic – perhaps none so much as James Coburn’s Britt. Poor Mexican farmers find Yul Brynner’s Chris Adams, a legendary gunslinger, and offer him all they have to come to their town and protect them from the ravages of the bandit Calvera, in what many consider Eli Wallach’s definitive film role. The Magnificent Seven, based on Akira Kurosawa’s 1954 Japanese film Seven Samurai, is classic western myth – a gunslinger takes up the plight of the underdog against overwhelming odds. Tickets are $10 and available at the theater box office and online at the R/C Theater website. Chris Palestrant, professor of music composition at ECSU, will offer his peek behind the curtain at 4 p.m. The movie will be screened at 4:30. The Don and Catharine Bryan Cultural Series will screen the film on Sunday, March 19 at the R/C Kill Devil Hills MovN. Bringing together one of the finest ensemble casts ever assembled, The Magnificent Seven is one of the finest westerns ever put on film.
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