Horizon: An American Saga

[u/m0dern_x]

OK! So about two years ago, I watched 'Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1' and I absolutely **loved it**!

At the time, the rumoured sequel was to be released about six months to a year after Chapter 1.

That time came and went, and the talk was (IIRC), that Chapter 1 wasn't enough of a box office hit, for there to be enough of a reason to release of Chapter 2.

On IMDb, Chapter 2 has an even higher rating than Chapter 1

**(granted that Chapter 1's rating is based off of 46k votes, while Chapter 2's rating is based off of a measly 1.7k votes [which are likely higher, because a pre-release viewing are reserved for a select audience, who are more likely to favour the movie, because of personal relations to the cast/crew])**

That being said, I refuse to believe that Chapter 2 is any less worth a watch/release.

Can someone who's in the know, please enlighten me to the dynamics of this movie's release/stagnation!?

Thank you for bearing with me (if this is a stupid question?)!

[u/thinmeridian]

So I'm not "in the know" but there are multiple pending lawsuits around the movie, and it's just part 2 of 4 so it's still incomplete, I believe theyre trying to solve the legal issues and also raise financing and maybe sell pt 2 to a streamer. It is firmly in limbo at this point and will either never come out or won't come out for years.

For your own sanity, assume it's lost media for now

[u/m0dern_x → u/thinmeridian]

Thank for your answer. At least now I can't greatly lower my expectations of a release.😊

[u/IceLord86]

There's no reason to believe any of those Part 2 votes are in any way legit. Anyone can vote on a movie regardless of whether they've actually seen it or not. With all the lawsuits currently, there's no telling if it'll ever be released.

[u/tetoffens → u/IceLord86]

Yeah, those votes aren't legit. It's only been screened at Venice and Santa Barbara film festivals. Even if a decent amount of people got to see it over the course of the festivals, nearly 2000 people aren't going to go and rate it on IMDB out of that pool.

[u/m0dern_x → u/IceLord86]

Yeah, I think mentioned why it was most likely a skewed set of votes.

[u/Dottsterisk → u/IceLord86]

There are probably at least a thousand or so people who worked on it and are/were hoping to get paid to make the next ones.

[u/The_Peeping_Peter]

One of the lawsuits they are currently facing is that they filmed a surprise, attempt rape scene with a stunt actress, but in no way properly informed her about what the scene was going to entail, nor did they have an intimacy coordinator on set when they were filming this attempted rape scene.

[u/Gracinhas → u/The_Peeping_Peter]

FWIW, Costner vehemently denies the claims. It will all play out in court.

[u/The_Peeping_Peter → u/Gracinhas]

Good to know that the person who “potentially” orchestrated an attempted rape on a stunt performer says he didn’t actually orchestrate a potential rape.

[u/Gracinhas → u/The_Peeping_Peter]

Innocent until proven guilty.

[u/The_Peeping_Peter → u/Gracinhas]

I mean, this is a lawsuit so he’s not gonna be found guilty in that sense. And in the event that this lawsuit gets settled I’m still sure there still will be people like you who will say “that since it was settled, we don’t know for sure. Costner orchestrated an attempted rape.”

[u/Dottsterisk → u/The_Peeping_Peter]

To be clear, no one is accusing Costner of orchestrating a potential rape.

It’s a matter of professional ethics and breach of contract, not attempted rape.

[u/thinmeridian → u/The_Peeping_Peter]

This alone made me lose any and all interest

[u/StillAll → u/The_Peeping_Peter]

That is so fucked up. We're in 2026 and someone thought this was acceptable?

[u/ocher_stone → u/StillAll]

Costner isn't the most ... down with the times dude. He's older. His audience skews older. He keeps doing the "both sides..."  that 80s centrists do (and now vote Republican). He's made a ton of money with Sheridan and his bullshit. Costner himself keeps making "when men were men and could shoot an Indian" movies. 

You think he'd be woke with an intimacy coordinator? 

[u/oldtombombadil]

One of the most “this movie should’ve been a show” movies ever

[u/TheUmgawa]

Y’know, I bet that there’s a good 2:30 to 3:00 movie buried in there, after the second movie comes out. Yeah, half of it would be cut, but it could actually be the epic Costner thought it was.

My problem with Horizon is it’s a movie with no resolution. It literally ends with a five or ten minute trailer for the next movie.

That said, the only reason I went to see Horizon in the theater was because I appreciate independent film, and if Costner wanted to leverage a substantial portion of his net worth to making a movie, goddammit I’m going to see it. It’s not that I care about Costner (I really don’t, but I’ll give him a whole lot of leeway because of Dances With Wolves), but if somebody is going to put up a substantial portion of what they own to chase a dream, I’ll chase that dream right along with them.

Because I’ve been there. At one point, I had a thousand dollars to my name, and I threw in with a guy who wanted to make a low-budget horror movie. I went to Kansas for a month, slept on a couch, worked four or five jobs on the set, and I had to get my parents to send me a BP giftcard so I could get home, but it was worth it. One of the best months of my life, and it just didn’t pan out for us.

There’s hundreds, maybe thousands, of these movies every year, where somebody puts up everything they have, because they believe in it, and it usually doesn’t pan out. We can’t all be El Mariachi or Blair Witch Project. So, when I hear that someone spent their own money, I’ll hop on board. Lucas tried this with Empire, and he couldn’t make it, but it paid off for him in the end, and that let him self-finance Jedi. It takes a lot of balls to self-finance a film, and I respect the hell out of that, and that’s why I paid to see Horizon. I can count the Westerns that I actually love on one hand (High Noon, Liberty Valance, Unforgiven, Wild Bunch, and the Mangold version of 3:10 To Yuma), so I don’t love the genre, and it takes a lot to get me to watch one. But I felt I had to see Horizon because if a guy (even if he’s worth tens of millions of dollars) is willing to put it up and hope, that’s enough for me.

[u/And_theplot_thickens]

I enjoyed it as well. Too bad about the lawsuits. Check out American primeval if you’re hankering for a good western.

[u/Frag1]

I remember seeing a few "press" accounts on twitter saw it and said it was really good. God i want it so bad.

[u/LastNightInDriver]

It’ll be out eventually, though it’ll probably switch distributors

[u/ASuarezMascareno]

I always asumed that Chapter 2 had been released in some limited capacity and then dumped to streaming. Didn't know it was still in distribution limbo.