I was not fortunate enough to see Se7en in the movie theaters but I have seen the movie more than once since its original release. I think this time was the first time I watched it differently though, I usually watch movies in anticipation of what is coming next, what will happen to the characters next. I have found over the past 15 weeks in this class, that by always watching movies like that, I’m missing out on some of the enjoyment of the movies themselves. Since I already knew what was going to happen in the movie, I watched it for moment it was in, not what was going to be. It was the first time I watched a movie for what is going on now as opposed to waiting for what is to come. This was also the first time that the movie had a very different feel to me, it was as if I knew what was going on. Therefore, I did not have to pay as much attention to the plot and could focus more on some of things that we have talked about in class, like the signs and moods set by the director.
The movie had a different feel to it regarding the location and place in time that it occurred. It could have been anywhere, any major city or even a just a major concentration of people without being defined as a city. The character, plot, and events did not seem dated, the only thing that had a dated feel to it was the technology, even that can be viewed a couple different ways. It could be the past where beepers, fax machines, and limited internet access are the cutting edge of technology, or it could be, that it is a society in full decay, where the luxuries we have now are no longer available to us and we have to rely on older outdated technology. This movie could be at any time, but it did not feel like the present. It could have been the past like a Wild West type city or it could have been an almost apocalyptic future where society is out of control and it on the verge of collapse.
Sommerset wants to get out, he wants to prevent Mills from becoming him, Sommerset is tired of this city, fed up with the death and destruction that is brought upon his desk. Sommerset is now only trying to get out as fast as he can, and he wants to save the remaining humanity that he has left inside himself. He wants to dissuade Mills from following the same path of loneliness and sadness that he himself has endured, futilely trying to bring the city from the depths of despair and blight. Sommerset knows that he is looking at a younger version of himself in Mills, when he see Mills look of hope that he can actually deter and reduce crime. Sommerset also sees the moment that Mills breaks when he kills John Doe and becomes all that he spent his life fighting against, and knows that Mills is lost forever.
Mills is trying to transfer up the ranks to tackle some of the more heinous crimes in the city in order to do his part to make the place safer from him and his wife. Mills believes that Sommerset is just old and tired and maybe he never really cared about his job or his city, he does not believe that after all this time, Sommerset has just become worn out from all the crime. Mills does not want to listen to anything Sommerset has to tell him, because Mills thinks Sommerset is just waiting for those last 6 days to be up so he can retire and leave the city. While Mills does love his wife, he seems more focused on making things better for the city and not focusing on his relationship with his wife, that is partly the reason that Tracy feels Sommerset would be a good confident to her and mentor to Mills. Mills gets so wrapped up in the case against John Doe that he does not take the time to step back and see the bigger picture the way Sommerset tries too. This tunnel vision focus, ultimately led Mills to believe that if he was fighting evil, no matter what he did it would be right, this is exactly what John Doe wanted, for when we fight the monster, we must be careful not to become a monster in the process.