When Kevin Costner revealed the trailer for “Horizon: An American Saga,” the first of his planned four-part epic about the American West, the two-time Academy Award winner looked positively giddy — at least over Zoom.
“Trailers have always been kind of a favorite part for me, even as a boy going to the movies,” Costner said, grinning as he unveiled the first footage in a virtual conversation with journalists. “You’re obviously there to see the movie you want, but isn’t it kind of cool when you see what’s coming? … And with that in mind, I did my very best to expose what’s going to be a four-part saga.”
“Horizon” chapters 1 and 2 will have a dual theatrical release from Warner Bros., with the first film hitting theaters on June 28 and the second debuting August 16. Costner’s goal in crafting the trailer was to find the moments in the film that would translate as sense of the ride audiences will take in these grand films, which focus on 15-year span of pre-and post-Civil War expansion and settlement of the American West.
“Can they, in a sense, feel themselves in this movie? Because that’s what I want people to feel in the dark, that [it] suddenly just absorbs them,” Costner teased. “We all know what happens when the lights go out — either something good, something average or something great. What I hope is that this is something that stays with them forever.”
The three minute trailer introduces “Horizon’s” ensemble cast — led by Costner’s Hayes Elllison, who rides into the frame with the stunning landscapes of Utah on full display —and tees up the action as the film explores the triumphs and tragedies brought on by the ideology of Manifest Destiny. The clip shares a first look at his co-stars Sienna Miller, Sam Worthington, Jena Malone, Abbey Lee, Michael Rooker, Danny Huston, Luke Wilson, Isabelle Fuhrman, Jeff Fahey, Will Patton, Tantanka Means, Owen Crow Shoe, Ella Hunt and Jamie Campbell Bower.
Among the footage is a harrowing scene in which Miller’s family is attacked by unseen assailants shooting arrows into their house and burning it down. The family is separated as Miller and her daughter hide in the basement while her son goes with his father to fight back. The clip also shows Wilson’s character leading a group of settlers along the treacherous voyage west. “All I’m trying to do is to get as many of us as I can, as far as I can,” he says desperately, as scenes of a funeral play out.
Much of the footage simply teases, rather than directly explains the film’s plot, offering glimpses of the Native American populations that will be featured in the film and possibly a romantic storyline between Costner’s Ellison and Abbey Lee.
“Use that much this year?” Bower’s character asks Costner near the end of the clip, as he uses his shotgun to reveal Costner’s holstered pistol.
“Haven’t had much need of it yet,” he replies, as the clip cuts to a scene in which Costner displays his quick draw skills.
“Looks like we’ve got ourselves a bad man right here,” Bower declares, chuckling as Costner walks away.
In addition to starring in the film, Costner directed the film from a script he co-wrote with Jon Baird. “Horizon: An American Saga” is Costner’s fourth directorial effort following 2003’s “Open Range,” 1997’s “The Post Man” and 1990’s Oscar best picture-winning “Dances With Wolves.”
“This is by far the biggest struggle,” Costner declared when asked if ‘Horizon’ or ‘Dances with Wolves’ was more difficult to make. “I’m shocked at what we were able to get. I shot ‘Dances’ for 106 days, I shot the movie you’re just seeing right now in 52. … I did learn a lot and I was able to use every trick in the book to try to bring this movie to ground and to bring it to an audience. And there’s four of them!”
In the conversation, moderated by Deadline’s Mike Fleming, Costner also detailed the origins of the project and explained why he held onto this idea for more than 30 years.
“It’s hard to fall out of love. I don’t do that,” Costner said. “Things that have a classic feel they don’t fall out of touch either. I think they exist in any decade. That’s the opportunity we have in cinema is to make something that lasts past its opening weekend. I’ve never banked on opening weekends; I banked on people wanting to revisit something.”
With “Horizon” specifically, Costner wasn’t deterred when no one wanted to finance the movie; in fact, that gave him the “bright idea to make four,” he quipped, adding that, “There’s a lot of people out there that know I’m a little bit of a hard-head or something.”
In terms of the film’s tone, he wanted to step away from the well-worn Western tropes.
“That’s a bit of a formula for the West, and when it’s done right, we never forget it. [But] too often it’s just a convenience for a hero guy to knock down a dumb guy,” Costner said. “We have a lot of Westerns that aren’t good, because they get too simplified. Westerns are, in fact, complicated, because this isn’t Disneyland. These were real lives. People just making their way. Women just trying to keep their families clean, fed, and basically worked to death. Women’s lives were short; all they did was have to work. I’m drawn to that. I mean, I’m always gonna get to my gunfight, but I’m drawn to the little things of what people had to endure.”
Because he was so passionate about this story, Costner said he eventually realized that he had to make it which mean looking to himself financially to do it.
“Not the smartest thing,” he admitted, alluding to the personal cost of risking his 10-acre Santa Barbara home to fund the movie series. “But I count on people. I count on the movie speaking louder than anything I can say. And so with that in mind, I just shoved West myself and I just left, and I went out to make this movie in Utah.
Costner then explained why he shot the film in the Beehive State. “When you go through Utah, it’s magic. And it wasn’t easy for us to do. There were certain things that weren’t set up that we see in other states. … But I kind of bypassed the smart business decision to go where my money could stretch farther.” Costner noted that the production spent over $100 million in Utah and employed more than 500 people over the course of the shoot. “We had an impact on the state, but the state had an impact on me.”
He also revealed that the movie was originally titled “Sidewinder,” but because he’d had a few movies that inspired copycats, like Robin Hood and Wyatt Earp, he wanted to throw the industry off his scent.
“I just thought, ‘I don’t want anybody stepping into whatever I’m trying to do,’ so I called it ‘Horizon’ and said it was written by my son just to disguise it when it went to the Writers Guild,” Costner said. “But the longer I started to think about it, the more I began to appreciate that dreams, going West, they’re always about ‘Out there.’ When you realize a country is bigger and farther than anyone ever dreamed, it is about the horizon.”
He explained: “Because everybody is looking for something — even today, in the relationships and what’s going on at work. They’re looking for room; they’re looking for fresh air. And our 200 year march across this country was no different.”
Costner also acknowledged the injustices that the film will explore, particularly as it explores the post-Civil War era, which he describes as “a mark on our country, however you choose to look at it — the loss of life, the reason it was fought, the things that we still haven’t solved, we’re still trying to come to terms with as a nation — but it closed the West in a blink of an eye.”
The war had kept the country’s on the east coast, but the minute it ended in 1865, everyone looked west again. “In 25 years, something that had been there for thousands of years, it was over. Our national appetite was to be satisfied at the at the disadvantage to those who had been there and flourished and were living in their own way,” Costner said, referring to the Indigenous populations who were crushed by the movement.
Reflecting on his own interest in the time period, he continued: “I don’t know that I’ve ever come to terms with that myself. I don’t know that I’m ashamed or embarrassed, but I want to project what really happened. There was a great injustice occurred in the West. But it doesn’t minimize the courage it took for my ancestors to actually cut loose and go there. And I recognize the resourcefulness, it took the bravery it took to leave and make this march across this country. It’s just a movie that kind of shows the clash of cultures. It’s our history.”
With so much experience in the western or cowboy genre in projects like “Dances With Wolves,” “Open Range,” and most recently as the star of “Yellowstone,” Costner cautioned that he’s not trying to reinvent the wheel with “Horizon.”
“You try not to separate yourself from the rest of the reindeer in terms of [saying] ‘I’m going to be different,’ because I’m not looking to set the record straight or make a history lesson,” he said of the film. “There’s just a way I look at movies: I’m gonna get to the action; I’m gonna get to my gunfight, but I’m gonna get there in maybe a different way. … The West is a real place with real issues.”
At the end of the day, Costner hopes to achieve a couple goals. “I want my little girl to see what her great, great, great-grandmother went through,” he said of his personal investment in the story. But on a broader scale, he hopes the ride is worth moviegoers’ money.
“The oldest profession is telling stories around a fire. We all want to hear a good one and we don’t want somebody to waste our time. And I take my time, I hope I don’t waste your time,” Costner said. “I made four of these. I’d like for us to all take those journeys and try to have a high understanding of this first one. The second one’s already shot. I’m out there, heading west again, pushing a rock uphill trying to make the third one. I know I’m a little bit kind of a joke, or it’s maybe humorous to even watch me, because it’s like, ‘Whoa, I wonder when he’s going to ever stop digging.’ I don’t know.”
At this point, the movie isn’t even his anymore. “Horizons” will now travel the world, as will the questions he’s been dreaming about for decades. Like, if he’d made that trek in the 1800s, would he have made it? He might not know the answer to that question, but he’s feeling pretty accomplished anyway.
“I’m terribly satisfied in my own life that God allowed me to get these first two done,” Costner said, quipping, “I mean, if I’m hit by lightning, who knows what happens? At least I went West.”
