The Frontier Thesis and the American West

The Magnificent Seven: The Taming of the American Frontier

The Magnificent Seven (1961) is a classic Western film which mythologizes the Old West as a wild, lawless place that can only be governed by the actions of a few good men. The film is an Americanized reboot of an even more famous Japanese classic film, The Seven Samurai, which depicts the actions of a terrorized Japanese town who ask a group of lordless, lawless samurai to protect them according to their code of honor. Not only does the referencing of the Japanese film make a claim for an American film to achieve the type of greatness as the Japanese film. It also suggests that the West, even though it contained terrible violence and risk, also called forth incredible nobility in the hearts of individuals like the gunslingers depicted in the film.

In the film, a Mexican town is being assaulted by bandits, led by a chief known as Calvera. Without any help from the law, they seek the assistance of Chris Adams, who, in classical superhero fashion, begins assembling a team of outlaw (but good-hearted) associates. Many of these men are down on their luck, and are otherwise unable to make their way in the world, other than by gunslinging, such as Vin Tanner, who has wasted all his money gambling. The gunslingers are also multiracial, at least in the context of the film (the nonwhite characters are still played by white actors). For example, Bernardo O’Reilly is Irish-Mexican, and the young Chico was once a farmer, although he is portrayed as the most hot-headed character aching for a fight in the film.

The film depicts the gunmen as gradually growing more and more attached to the villagers, and becoming more and more integrated in village life. Even when the villagers’ own will to overcome Calvera’s gang begins to waver, Chris demands that they fight back, which is ultimately shown to be the right thing to do. Bravery in the face of violence, even if one is an underdog, is also yet another important code of surviving in the west. The gunmen also share their food with the village children, and four of them die protecting the lives of the most vulnerable citizens. Although the Seven are not conventional, law-abiding people, unlike Calvera, they have their own code of justice. Again, this plays into the Western mythology of a land that does not need control by outsiders and sets its own terms for survival and justice.

The Seven’s lack of a sense of place or secure grounding in any code of the federal government are embodied in one of the film’s final lines that they are “like the wind, blowing over the land and passing on.” The villagers may farm the land and require security; there are also a mixed group of more vulnerable people within the village of women, children, and the elderly. All of the Seven are men, relatively young and able-bodied, and have no ties to a specific place. This idea of the West as a place that is not owned also resonates with many of the themes described in Cobbs (et al., 2016) as the West as a place that is uncivilized, arid, lawless, until settlers come and colonize the territory.

Of course, this was very far from the truth. The West housed many complex civilizations, like those of the Native Americans. Native Americans who resisted white control and demanded to retain their civilization as it was were portrayed as evil and brutal in white-authored literature, such as the natives who defeated General Custer at Little Big Horn. Despite the fact that Native Americans operated at an extreme disadvantage relative to their white counterparts, in terms of ammunition, horses, and support, they were portrayed as warlike savages, and only good if they supported white control. Additionally, the relationship between the United States and Mexico was extremely fraught. Once again, American control was viewed as a civilizing influence. The right of Mexico to exercise authority over the land which eventually became the state of Texas was not acknowledged.

On one hand, The Magnificent Seven does portray the Mexican village as a valuable place, and the people as honorable people. On the other hand, the small town still requires outside, American influence to become functional again, and the local bandits must be killed by outside Americans. The village actively calls for the American gunmen to come in and to make life normal again. The gunmen are willing to sacrifice their lives of what is right. The gunmen do not wish to colonize, but are asked to bring their influence.

The Magnificent Seven embodies the frontier thesis, as articulated by Frederick Turner. “The frontier is the line of the most rapid and effective Americanization” (Cobbs et al. 41). The individual who moves into the wilderness loses European customers and instead adopts those suitable for the frontier. “Little by little he transforms the wilderness,” but the settler also becomes more native, and more American and less European (Cobbs et al. 41). Society is less complex and more individualistic in the West, as can be seen in the rapidly-created ties between the seven men, and the ways those ties are rapidly dissipated. The codes of the hired guns do exist, and are just as valuable and unspoken as the ancient samurai, but they are generated by the wildness of the environment, otherwise the men and the villagers will die (and even pursuing their rough code, many still do). To live in the West requires “coarseness and strength” rather than following a conventional code of justice or the letter of the law (Cobbs et al. 41)