Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Quiet Muffin This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

Zlatica One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

wbdinsmoor These "Mongol" bandits speak (rather poor) Mandarin Chinese rather than Mongolian, and the wrestling scene showed absolutely nothing of the famous Mongolian wrestling style. Other than that, I enjoyed the movie (shown on the Turner Classic Movies channel). It was a bit disappointing that Ford did not choose an East Asian to play the main "Mongolian" role - just as actresses like Katherine Hepburn played Chinese in movies like The Good Earth - but given the facts of Hollywood life at that time, this is understandable. An interesting subplot runs between the doctor and the head of mission: who is more Christ-like, she who talks the talk or she who walks the walk?

bill-smythe A jewel of a film – with superb acting in the 2 principal roles! Should be shown much more often. Failings in the set and in the minor characters are more than made up for by the vital intelligence of the presentation. The film is about religion and sex, and nothing else – and it is that simplicity that makes it fascinating. Bancroft has the role of saint and Leighton is the sinner. Is the poor exposure of this excellent film anything to do with lobbying from the churches, I wonder - after all it must be somewhat embarrassing for them to have an atheist doubling as a saint and a devout catholic doubling as a religious maniac. The saint sacrifices herself for the majority, just as Jesus was sacrificed. The sinner showed the intolerance characteristic of all religious bodies. By the way, smoking and drinking had already been established for Hollywood characters long before 1966, male and female. It was pushed by lobbying and bribery from the tobacco and alcohol industries and Bogart was a prominent and pitiful victim. So I do not see the smoking and drinking of the Bancroft character as primarily male characteristics. As for the rather muted rudeness she displayed at times, this I see as a very natural reaction to the infernal hypocrisy of the Leighton character - a 'devout catholic' who does not even believe in God – "I am looking for something that does not exist" she says. What superb realism.The end of the film is the only part I did not think satisfying or realistic – in view of the character of the doctor. She is obviously a fighter and a very courageous woman. Her final action was cowardly and not in her character at all. All that was necessary was a few more days of cajoling the chief into sufficient liberty to get a horse to match her riding breeches - there were plenty of horses around – then kill the bastard, with perhaps a few more thrown in, and make for the main gate pronto.In conclusion, the film shows a riveting clash of values in a theater piece that hardly needs any set. And the atheist comes out a clear winner. Good for you John Ford!

stevehulett "Seven Women" is the last feature film of John Ford, arguably the greatest director the United States has yet produced. After a half century of film making, Ford ended his fabled career with a wide screen feature about women in peril at a Chinese mission. Infirm and alcoholic, he filmed it on an MGM sound stage; MGM then cut it and tossed it away on the bottom half of a double bill.Today, the film is little known and seldom seen. It is far from Ford's best work, yet there is power and believability in many of the lead performances, and power in the arc of the story. Anne Bancroft shines as a feisty New York doctor who ultimately sacrifices herself to save the other missionaries -- many whom she doesn't agree with -- from brutal deaths at the hands of Chinese bandits. Her work here is more forceful and better realized than her role of Mrs. Robinson, done two years later.The best gift MGM/Sony could give lovers of serious cinema is a clean print of this forgotten film. Its sets are often glaringly artificial, and some of the secondary players are over the top (an old weakness of Ford's) as well as miscast, but "7W" is a far better film than Hollywood legend has told us.

Enrique Sanchez I am still reeling from the powerful ending to this unspoken of movie. John Ford's last entry onto his glittering resumé stuns while it holds your interest at every turn of a scene.It is so hard to resist talking about the ending of this movie. It seethes with so much devastating darkness. And yet, within this darkness, there is a human victory so profoundly complex as to take your breath away in resignation, anger, shock and inevitable acceptance.Anne Bancroft has always been one of my favorite actresses. With all her celebrated roles, I still feel that the depth of talent has never been fully appreciated.Yet, in this role, she displays her talents aplenty.I recommend this seldomly seen movie and I hope it will be brought to VHS or DVD one day so that more will see this movie and its production will not be in vain.