The screenplay, credited to William Roberts, is a remake – in an Old West-style – of Akira Kurosawa's 1954 Japanese film Seven Samurai (itself initially released in the United States as The Magnificent Seven).

The ensemble cast includes Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter, James Coburn, and Horst Buchholz[4] as a group of seven gunfighters hired to protect a small village in Mexico from a group of marauding bandits led by Eli Wallach.

[6][7] A gang of bandits led by Calvera periodically raids a poor Mexican village for food and supplies.

They include Vin Tanner, a gunfighter gone broke from gambling; Chris' friend Harry Luck, who assumes Chris is hiding a much bigger reward for the work; the Irish Mexican Bernardo O'Reilly, who has fallen on hard times; Britt, an expert in both knife and gun who joins purely for the challenge involved; and the dapper, on-the-run gunman Lee, plagued by nightmares of fallen enemies and so haunted that he has lost his nerve for battle.

He later signed a deal with Yul Brynner's production company, who bought the rights from Morheim for $10,000 up front plus $1,000 a week as a producer and 5% of the net profits.

[9] Brynner approached producer Walter Mirisch with the idea of remaking Kurosawa's famous samurai film.

Associate producer Morheim commissioned Walter Bernstein, a blacklisted scriptwriter, to produce the first draft "faithfully" adapted from the original script written by Shinobu Hashimoto, Hideo Oguni and Akira Kurosawa; when Mirisch and Brynner took over the production, they brought on Walter Newman, whose version "is largely what's onscreen."

When Newman was unavailable to be onsite during the film's principal photography in Mexico, William Roberts was hired, in part to make changes required by Mexican censors.

[15] James Coburn was a great fan of the Japanese film Seven Samurai, having seen it 15 times, and was hired through the help of co-star and former classmate Robert Vaughn, after the role of the expert knifethrower had been rejected by actors Sterling Hayden and John Ireland.

[21] During filming there was considerable tension between Brynner and McQueen, who was displeased at his character having only seven lines of dialogue in the original shooting script.

Along with the readily recognized main theme and effective support of the story line, the score also contains allusions to twentieth-century symphonic works, such as the reference to Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra, second movement, in the tense quiet scene just before the shootout.

Electric guitar cover versions by Al Caiola in the U.S. and John Barry[25] in the U.K. were successful on the popular charts.

In 1994, James Sedares conducted a re-recording of the score performed by The Phoenix Symphony Orchestra, which also included a suite from Bernstein's score for The Hallelujah Trail, issued by Koch Records; Bernstein himself conducted the Royal Scottish National Orchestra for a performance released by RCA in 1997, but the original film soundtrack was not released until the following year by Rykodisc.

The opening horn riff in Arthur Conley's 1967 hit "Sweet Soul Music" is borrowed from the theme.

Celtic Football Club (Glasgow, Scotland) used the theme music whenever Henrik Larsson scored a goal.

In 1995, the KLF also did a drum and bass cover of the main title as "The Magnificent"; it was released under the group alias One World Orchestra on the charity compilation The Help Album.

Portions of the theme play as the train exits the Grand Canyon diorama tunnel behind Phantom Manor, enters Frontierland, and travels along the bank of the Rivers of the Far West.

[27] In the United States and Canada, the film earned $2.25 million in theatrical rentals[28] and was a box office disappointment, but proved to be such a smash hit in Europe that it ultimately made a profit.

"[36] According to Variety, "Until the women and children arrive on the scene about two-thirds of the way through, The Magnificent Seven is a rip-roaring rootin' tootin' western with lots of bite and tang and old-fashioned abandon.

"[38] Harrison's Reports praised the film as "A superb Western, well acted and crammed full of action, human interest, pathos, suspense, plus some romance and humor.

"[39] A positive review from Charles Stinson in the Los Angeles Times praised the dialogue as "by turns, virile, rowdily funny and then, abruptly, not always predictably, it is pensive, even gentle.

John Sturges' direction is superbly staccato; making a knife-sharp use of pauses and silences, it brings out both the humor and melancholy, the humanity as well as the evil inherent in the situation.

"[41] Akira Kurosawa was reportedly so impressed by the film that he presented John Sturges with a sword,[42] but said: "The American copy is a disappointment.

"[43] The film has grown greatly in esteem since its release, partly as several of its cast went on to become superstars, and its music score, but also due to the quality of the script.

The consensus reads, "The Magnificent Seven transplants Seven Samurai into the Old West with a terrific cast of Hollywood stars—and without losing any of the story's thematic richness.

Robert Vaughn was a recurring guest star, a judge who hires the seven to protect the town in which his widowed daughter-in-law and his grandson live.

In 1981, The Clash released a song, "The Magnificent Seven", the third single from their fourth album, Sandinista!, which references the title of the 1960 film.

[45][46][47] A group of mercenaries, including ones played by George Peppard (as a character known only as "Space Cowboy") and Robert Vaughn (playing essentially the same character as in The Magnificent Seven) defend farmers from space raiders on the planet Akir, home of the Akira (named after Seven Samurai director Akira Kurosawa).

The Magnificent Seven, a remake of the film with the same title, was released in 2016, directed by Antoine Fuqua and starred Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D'Onofrio, Lee Byung-hun, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Martin Sensmeier and Peter Sarsgaard.