Kevin Costner Explores American Expansion in New Western HORIZON
By Movieguide® Contributor
Kevin Costner wants his two-part western HORIZON: AN AMERICAN SAGA to inspire audiences.
“Well, I think that we want to see these characters grow, you know. I saw the second one yesterday, and it’s just as good as the first one, if not better, and the truth is the next one gets harder. It doesn’t get easier for the people that went West,” Costner told Movieguide®. “I wanted to make that clear, but I also wanted to do it in an entertaining way. Entertaining meaning can you watch it and go, ‘Yes, I’m engaged in this.'”
The movie explores “the lure of the Old West and how it was won—and lost—through the blood, sweat and tears of many.”
The pioneers’ perseverance inspired Costner.
“I think that, you know, there was it was a promise, but there was no guarantee,” he said. “Most people headed West weren’t even equipped to know what they were going to run into. When they got out there, they realized that somebody else had been living there for thousands of years, so there was this conflict, cataclysmic clash of cultures, and it was one-sided. It was ugly, but I also recognize the resourcefulness of our ancestors who managed to just keep coming.”
He also hopes the movie will help young people want to engage with older western movies.
“I can’t change where their disposition is about a western, but I can change perhaps their feelings about it,” he explained. “Once they watch it and go, ‘Maybe that’s what my grandpa liked about them — that there was an authenticity. Something real. Something was on the line.’ I even saw myself in the young man in the house, in the young man who made his escape. I saw myself. What would I have done? I think in our movies we have to be able to see ourselves.”
Part of the review reads:
HORIZON: AN AMERICAN SAGA – CHAPTER 1 is a sprawling western epic, starring and directed by Kevin Costner. A group of settlers starts a small community in the southwest territory near Apache land. The chief’s angry son attacks the settlers in a murder raid. A big battle ensues. The U.S. Army advises the survivors to come live at the fort, because their town is too far away to protect. Meanwhile, enticed by a flyer about the town, called Horizon, a large wagon train travels southwest toward Horizon. Finally, a cowpoke gunfighter ends up protecting a young woman and the baby of her kidnapped friend, who’s presumed dead. They flee the baby’s angry patriarchal family by heading southwest.
Chapter 1 of HORIZON presents an impressive, spectacular vision with exciting, engaging action. It also has several moving moments among some of the characters. The movie takes a pretty even-handed attitude toward the settlers and the Apaches. However, Chapter 1 of HORIZON has intense violence, strong foul language, a brief scene of nudity, and a partially depicted bedroom scene. Chapter 2 is being released Aug. 16.
“There is this belief in something better, and that still exists in America. This film kind of explores the inception of the American dream,” she added.
HORIZON: AN AMERICAN SAGA – CHAPTER 1 arrives in theaters on June 28. CHAPTER 2 will open on Aug. 16.
Check out the rest of Movieguide®’s interview with Costner and other cast members here:
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