Critics get a lot of guff for being negative all the time, especially when confronted with a movie like Horizon: An American Saga — Chapter 1, Kevin Costner’s opening installment of an epic Western saga he self-financed for a whole lot of money.
At three hours and one minute, just this first part of Horizon is a whole lot of movie, a sprawling narrative that takes place all over the United States (west of the Mississippi, that is). For many of the (non-Native) characters, they’re hoping to find a new settlement called Horizon, in the Southern California area. For everyone, though, there’s only one real goal: survival.
Horizon’s first chapter, following its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, has received less than glowing reviews: The Los Angeles Times critic Katie Walsh called it “a massive boondoggle, a misguided and excruciatingly tedious cinematic experience. That Costner has promised three more installments feels like a threat.”
Having seen this first chapter on the big screen, as God and Costner intended, I confess that I may agree with the critical majority on its problems. I have, however, done my best to come up with the below positive notes about the film. Nine of them!
01. It Doesn’t Feel Quite as Long as You’d Think
Horizon: An American Saga — Chapter 1 (Warner Bros.)
During my screening, I spent a fair amount of time mentally pumping myself up like I would while on a long run, with thoughts like, “We’re definitely at least half an hour in by now,” “Really, it’s just like watching three episodes of an HBO drama, no big deal,” and “This has to be the halfway point.” (I could have sneakily checked my phone to track our progress, but that felt like cheating.)
Just a few minutes after I’d told myself, “We’ve got to be at least two hours in,” a montage arrived that can only be described as “Next time, on Horizon…” And then, after that extended tease of events to come, the credits!
In all honesty, because there are so many storylines happening at once in Horizon, there’s rarely a moment that feels stagnant. The downside is that because so much is happening with minimal context, very few of these moments land with enough emotional resonance to make an impact on the viewer, beyond whatever short-term emotions might be summoned. There’s one exception to this…
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