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The film writer Corey Atad returns for a show about the return of Kevin Costner to the director’s chair with the first chapter of his planned four-part theatrical western epic Horizon: An American Saga.

Costner resuscitated his career as a leading man thanks to television with Yellowstone and then surprisingly left the series to begin work on Horizon (which may have been a factor in his wife’s filing for divorce after he started selling his properties to finance the production). Warner Bros. through its studio New Line Cinema agreed to release the first two instalments, initially scheduled to open within weeks of one another, but when the first chapter tanked at the box office the studio indefinitely postponed the release of Chapter Two.

Corey and I went to see the first one (in an empty theatre) and we talk about the film as Costner’s personal vision, how it compares to his other films as a director, and how this planned theatrical epic still cannot escape the shadow of television or transcend the history of the genre.

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Teaser trailer for Horizon: An American Saga, Chapter One and Two (Costner, 2024)