The eagerly awaited epic Western will have its world premiere in May at the prestigious event.
Ooh-la-la, Pardners! Horizon: An American Saga, the first of four planned epic Westerns starring and directed by Kevin Costner, will have its world premiere May 19 as a noncompetitive entry at France’s prestigious 2024 Cannes Film Festival.
“I’d like to thank the Festival de Cannes for including my film Horizon: An American Saga in this year’s selection,” Costner said Monday in a prepared statement. “It’s been 20 years since I’ve had the pleasure of being on the Croisette. I’ve been waiting for the right time to return and I’m proud to say that this time has come. Horizon: An American Saga is a story that began 35 years ago, and I can’t think of a better place than Cannes to reveal to the world the result of such a wonderful adventure. The French have always supported films and believed deeply in filmmaking. Just as I believe deeply in my film.”
Warner Bros. is slated to release the first of two Horizon films on June 28, with the second arriving in theaters two months later, on Aug. 16.
Horizon has Costner riding alongside such notable co-stars as Sienna Miller, Sam Worthington, Jena Malone, Abbey Lee, Michael Rooker, Danny Huston, Luke Wilson, Isabelle Fuhrman, Jeff Fahey, Will Patton, Tatanka Means, Owen Crow Shoe, Ella Hunt, Jamie Campbell Bower.
What’s it all about? As Costner told the showbiz website Deadline: “America’s expansion into the West was one that was fraught with peril and intrigue from the natural elements, to the interactions with the Indigenous peoples who lived on the land, and the determination and at many times ruthlessness of those who sought to settle it. Horizon tells the story of that journey in an honest and forthcoming way, highlighting the points of view and consequences of the characters life and death decisions.”
“It’s a really beautiful story; it’s a hard story,” Costner told Variety. “It really involves a lot of women, to be honest. There are a lot of men in it, too, but the women are really strong in Horizon. It’s just them trying to get by every day in a world that was impossibly tough. They were often [dragged] out to these places because that’s where the men wanted to go; women were following their men. They didn’t ask to be in these territories that were unsettled and dangerous, and life wasn’t easy. I’ve chosen to make sure that was really obvious, that that wasn’t easy, and how vulnerable people were.”