Legal Theory: Se7en (David Fincher)

FOREWORD: This was an assignment for my Law class. We had to chose a film to write about from a legal theory perspective. The subheadings were a requirement!

Se7en (David  Fincher, 1995)

“Long is the way, and hard, that out of hell leads up to light” – John Milton: Paradise Lost.

A lawyer is found, having bled to death in his office, with the word “Greed” written on the carpet in blood. A model is forced to choose between permanent facial disfigurement and death by overdose with the word “Pride” written on her wall. A drug-abuser and child molester is bound to his bed and kept alive for exactly one year, with the word “Sloth” written above him.

Each murder brings a twisted killer closer and closer to fulfilling his extremist objective: a morally purified society. If this is his method of bringing society’s true crimes to light, long and hard certainly is the way to achieving it.

Homicide Detective William Somerset (Morgan Freeman) is one week away from his long awaited retirement from the police force. Rookie Detective David Mills (Brad Pitt) is in his first week after naively requesting a transfer to Somerset’s branch. Somerset is calm, level headed and considerate, whereas Mills is emotionally driven, reckless and eager. The two are partnered to investigate a case involving a brutally perverse killer with unknown motives. However a theme does become evident when the killings begin taking after each of the seven deadly sins. As the film follows the two lead detectives, we see them dissect the psyche of their culprit, placing him on the stand and reading into his every move. But as the film reaches its climax, the tables begin to turn and we watch as the detectives are jerked about and ultimately become the ones facing judgment.

Speech and Silence

Seven, when juxtaposed with the classical Western or Revenge genre film, has many similarities both thematically and in its structure. The standard Revenge film follows a specific format, outlined in Dean Hitesman’s article Setting the Stage for Justice in the Revenge Genre Film. Typically the law silences the truth holder (usually this person is considered the hero and ultimately the avenger), which then causes them to take matters into their own hands. Applying this to Seven, the person being silenced, perhaps even the truth-holder, is the character John Doe (Kevin Spacey), the sadistic serial killer. John Doe is being silenced from communicating his beliefs by the laws in place, which, in his mind, enable and sometimes encourage sinful behaviour. He then takes matters into his own hands through brutal acts of violence and torture, inflicting punishment on his victims for their respective sins in a way that the law neglects to enforce.

It’s certainly no surprise that as an audience we always expect the hero/avenger figure to be someone likable and easy to empathize with due to their quest for justice. So perhaps this is why Seven is considered a western turned on its head. John Doe is fighting for justice, a justice that many people hope for, just not in the traditional way. He shares his feelings on this with the detectives in one of the final scenes. When asked why he chose to take such extreme measures he replies evenly, “Wanting people to listen, you can’t just tap them on the shoulder anymore. You have to hit them with a sledgehammer, and then you’ll notice you’ve got their strict attention”

Insiders and Outlaws

At first glance, it is pretty clear who assumes the roles of the insiders and the outlaws. Detectives Somerset and Mills have a perspective on these crimes that the general public does not. They’ve researched the case in ways that aren’t always legal and put themselves in the killer’s direct line of fire. By the point in the film when they have started communicating with him, they become the insiders. However, as do most things in this movie, the lines quickly blur.

                  As the culprit of heinous crimes, John Doe is very certainly an outlaw throughout the film. However, on a broader scale, the strict moral code that he lives by, and his determination to make those who disrupt it pay for their wrongdoings, John Doe in a certain light, represents a highly moralistic version of the law itself. In the film’s climax, Detective Mills becomes blind with fury at the murder of his wife. Counting on this all along, John Doe waits for Mills to shoot him dead, an act of wrath, which will complete his masterpiece as the seventh and final sin. This foresight shared by Somerset who tries desperately to intervene, puts John Doe in the place of the Insider, while Detective Mills has been reduced to an act of violence that ultimately unifies him and the killer.

Change

As has already been mentioned, role reversal is a common occurrence in this film. Characters begin as one thing and morph into something else completely as circumstances change. These changes are the most prevalent in the two detectives. Somerset is a veteran of the harsh city crime scene and spends his entire career respecting the rules, though constantly straying from the complacency that is common practice in the law force. The catalyst for his change is the arrival of Detective Mills who exhibits every character trait that Somerset does not have. Once they start working together, Somerset who is nearly finished with the job once and for all, seems powerless to Mills’ disregard for protocol. The deeper into the case they get, the more Somerset surrenders to the convenience of illegal activity. This begins when the two of them enter John Doe’s home without a search warrant and, later, they pay off a man to give them the library records under John Doe’s name.

As the detectives stray farther and farther from what is ethically correct, they separate themselves from the law and become both outlaws and insiders with the perspective this gives them.

Legal Relevance

                  Despite how hazy the true intentions of each character are, the three leads in the film each fall quite neatly into different legal archetypes. Detective Somerset has seen every trick in the book. He handles every case with the same responsibility and sage consideration that he always has. These qualities show that Somerset is the Wise Old Man archetype in this film. He does, however, have a compassionate side that is often discouraged. Somerset questions the complacency that he is encouraged to practice, constantly striving for the betterment of society. He, more than anyone, acknowledges that not every circumstance can be made to fit into the legal system. Somerset’s beliefs are comparable to that of a legal Naturalist.

Detective Mills is a different story. He is driven by his emotions and has no regard for the processes in place, as they seem too forgiving for a criminal like John Doe. Throughout the film he resembles the Realist, as his empathy is in direct correlation to the crime committed. The worse the crime, the less patience he has for formalities. He isn’t innocent in his feelings, but he is somewhat naïve, lacking the perspective to understand what he’s fighting for. Detective Mills is the archetypal Child. And finally, there’s John Doe. His intentions are clear, his methods are destructive but his motivation is strong. He is selfless in his efforts right up until the point that he must die for his cause. Nowhere does it say that he has to be godly to be a Martyr. He strikes a balance somewhere between Somerset and Mills in pursuits of justice. He is a true Positivist in his beliefs. The law is the law and it makes no difference what circumstances brought you there. This is the way that John Doe selects his victims, unmercifully. The only difference is that he’s operating by his own code of justice, which is considerably less forgiving.

Judgement

            Judgement comes in many forms throughout this film.  From a typical legal standpoint, it is John Doe who is being judged for his actions by the law. Once he’s captured he is at the mercy of the law and understanding that his scheme isn’t yet complete, there is plenty of pressure for a swift resolution. After a particular conversation in which Mills asks him if he realizes that he’s insane, he replies “It’s much more comfortable for you to label me as insane”. This is an example of one kind of judgment in the film, though there is another.

John Doe’s crimes never come from a place of simplicity. His beliefs are no longer supported by the general public, and the law has barricaded him from preaching his sermon to the people who need to hear it most. It is when we realize this that we realise that John Doe is the personification of judgement in this film. He is assessing the crime and distributing the punishment. Perhaps it’s the similarities between his intentions and those of the law that make this film so scary. The law may not take such extreme measures to maintain justice but at the root of its purpose it is striving for a certain order, which reminds us again how unsettlingly similar John Doe is to the law itself.

Does the film get the Job Done?

                  Seven is a deeply unsettling portrait of a man in pursuit of a better world. Detective Somerset imagines a place that he could be proud of but has long since lost hope in achieving such a high ideal. Rather than reaching out to humanity, he retires from his job to seek out a happier life, a plausible solution considering the field he’s worked so many years in.

John Doe, though a murderous psychopath, really isn’t that different. He’s just a man striving for the same high ideals as Somerset. The difference between them is that one is taking personal responsibility for his dissatisfaction and the other is making society pay.

Because Detective Somerset is someone that we, as an audience can relate to, it makes it all the more horrifying when these similarities are brought to light. Somerset, narrates at the very end of the film, saying: “Ernest Hemmingway once wrote ‘The world is a fine place, and worth fighting for’. I agree with the second part”. 



By Matilda Davidson, 17