Sensmeier has star power - it's just too bad that in 'Magnificent Seven' he didn't have more lines

A couple of weeks after interviewing Yakutat-born actor Martin Sensmeier, who plays Red Harvest, one of the Magnificent Seven in the movie by the same name, I finally got to see the remake. One has to get past anachronisms of dress and historical mythology, problems involving the laws of physics and the actual capacities of various firearms, but all in all it's a pretty respectable re-telling of the classic tale in which a few fighters hold off an army. The cinematography is straightforward and beautiful. The pacing is spot on. The performances to the point and compelling.

Sensmeier had said one of his biggest challenges in the film was learning to ride bareback. His easy dismount early in the film showed he'd mastered that part of the process. I'm not so sure that he did the re-mounting scene since that was shot from the back. But most of the time he was on his own feet, usually zipping arrows off in the direction of bad guys.

[From Yakutat to Hollywood – Martin Sensmeier's journey from Alaska]

His climactic scene came when he battles to the death with a bad Indian named, believe it or not, Denali, played by Jonathon Joss, the Texas actor who may be best known for his part in the 2010 remake of "True Grit." Denali is the only character who has fewer lines than Red Harvest.

I was disappointed that Sensmeier didn't have more to say. His combined words in Comanche and English didn't surpass a few dozen. But in a Hollywood western, dialogue just gets in the way. Even the meatiest lines given to the big name stars in this movie didn't convey much. The formula is: Let the guns do the talking.

Sensmeier also has little, if anything, to say as a warrior in the new HBO "Westworld." That should change with his movie projects now in post-production. "Wind River" is a contemporary detective story set on a reservation.  "False Memory Syndrome," is a sci-fi thriller. In both he has major roles. The Independent Movie Database site has him at the top of the cast lists for both films using its "STARmeter" rating.

Both shows feature a lot of performers with a lot of experience. The leading lady in "Wind River" is Elizabeth Olsen, aka Scarlet Witch in the Marvel superheroes franchise flicks. "False Memory Syndrome," has Peter Stormare, known for recurring characters in "Longmire" and "Prison Break;" Michael Benyaer who recently had the part of Warlord in "Deadpool;" veteran Don Stark, lovingly remembered as the father of "Hot" Donna in "That '70s Show," among others who long ago became "name" figures in show business.

To find Sensmeier's STARmeter rating higher than that kind of talent suggests he has bigger things coming.

A sharp-eyed reader pointed out that another Yakutater was also seen by millions. Walter Porter, who grew up in Haines and eventually moved to Anchorage, was tending bar in Honolulu when a casting agent decided he looked a lot like Jack Lord, the main man on "Hawaii 5-0." Porter was used as a body double for Lord, though he appears not to have been credited. He died in 2013.

It turns out that Sensmeier is not the only member of the Magnificent Seven with an Alaska connection. A 2014 interview with co-star Chris Pratt in Gentlemen's Quarterly revealed that he lived in Alaska for four years as a small child. That would have been in the 1980s. The interview said his family joined his father at "a gold-mining camp in remote Alaska." They relocated to Washington state where Pratt grew up, "but Alaska is where Chris's lifelong love of guns began."