Horizon: An American Saga Part One (2024)

It's sadly no surprise whatsoever that Horizon: An American Saga Part Two has been pulled from theatres next month. Kevin Costner has poured a huge amount of his own money into this project, one that is supposed to last four chapters, and one that already looks like two is the maximum we're going to get.

It feels like a long time since we've had an epic sweeping western on our cinema screens; and although Scott Cooper's 2017 film Hostiles received very good reviews, you arguably have to go back to Costner's own Open Range (2003) for one that was even remotely widely released. Sadly, Horizon Part One has bombed so badly that we're not going to get Part Two any time soon on the big screen- if at all.

There's no doubting appetite for a potentially twelve hour, four part western was limited- but selfishly I was gagging for every second of it. The reviews were far from great, but everything about it sounded right up my street.

And so it proved.

Horizon is a throwback western in every respect, and Costner's world building is sublime. There's a few interconnecting stories as you might expect, but these are threads that haven't even begun to intertwine by the end of Part One. This in itself will be a problem for many, but most of the negative reviews I've read seem to be faulting Horizon for simply being Part One, which seems a tad bizarre.

Every cliche of the genre is lovingly captured by Costner. We begin in 1860 America, where the Civil War rages- but our attention is on the West, where expansion continues; initially just a couple of people marking out land in the wilderness aided by the promise of a as yet non-existent settlement called 'Horizon' on a handbill. These initial settlers are swiftly killed by local Apaches, but are just as quickly replaced by more colonisers. It's clear this disagreement over land is going to continue for some time, and Costner is quick to ensure we get to know the Apaches as well as the colonisers, a touch that is one of the few welcome adjustments to the old school style western that generally portrayed good and bad as black and white.

It's a while before we see Costner himself, by which time we've been introduced to another couple of stories including sex worker Marigold (Abbey Lee) whose sister has been harbouring a stolen child- and this is the subplot that Costner's Hayes stumbles into. A bit later on we also meet Luke Wilson leading a wagon train along the Santa Fe trail, alongside an English couple so far out of their comfort zone, we know that things aren't going to go smoothly for them.

With all these threads going on, it's asking a lot to keep the viewer enthralled for the duration considering the pace and length of the film. But I was captivated for the entire duration, so much so that when I realised I needed the toilet I thought we were about halfway through- but the film ended ten minutes later. I was engrossed in every section of the film, and each section spends an ideal amount of time doing what it needs to do to keep you involved in the story. I seem to be the only voice that feels this way however, proven by the almost instant cancellation of Part Two's initial release following the opening box office figures Horizon has produced. It's such a shame; although you do wonder how much Costner's television western series Yellowstone (2018-) might have hampered Horizon in the sense that people are used to television sized chunks when it comes to Costner and westerns more recently.

But that's really clutching at straws. People's concentration spans are pathetic now, and sitting in a cinema for three hours without being able to scroll inanely through Instagram is clearly many people's idea of hell. Sadly, they will happily sit for six hours of an evening binge watching a TV show because they can still more or less just look at their phones for the duration. It's a sad reflection of society today, and it means we're certain to miss out on Horizon's full scope and Costner's complete vision. Certainly in cinematic form anyway.

I'm hoping that the decision to delay Part Two's release (supposedly to allow more people time to discover the first part) doesn't end up being a never ending delay or an eventual switch to a streaming release, because (and I appreciate I might be the only one) I absolutely loved almost everything about Horizon. 8.5/10