NEW YORK (AP) — The second chapter of Kevin Costner’s ambitious Western blockbuster “Horizon: An American Saga” was pulled from theaters in August after the first film underperformed in theaters.
New Line Cinema announced Wednesday that “Horizon: Chapter 2” will not hit theaters as scheduled on Aug. 16. The studio had planned to release the two “Horizon” films back-to-back in an unusually quick succession of films, but the distributor changed its mind after the first film grossed a modest $23 million in its first two weeks in theaters.
“Territory Pictures and New Line Cinema have made the decision not to release Horizon: Chapter 2 on August 16 in order to provide audiences with more opportunities to see the first Horizon film over the coming weeks,” a New Line spokesperson said in a statement.
As of now, “Chapter 2” doesn’t have a release date on the theatrical calendar. The first film, “Horizon,” hit theaters on June 28 and will be available on premium on-demand on July 16. A release date for Max has yet to be announced. The change in plans was first reported by The Hollywood Reporter.
The move was a humble admission that Costner’s decades-old passion project, heavily promoted in theaters but not embraced by audiences, cost about $100 million to make, making the first chapter of “Horizon,” which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May, extremely difficult, if not impossible, to profit from. Costner has already begun filming the third movie in what will eventually be a four-part series, which he is also investing his own money into.
When asked about the films being released in theaters back-to-back in May, Costner said, “The studio wanted to try that. They knew the films would be released pretty quickly, like every four or five months. That might have been easier. But they felt this was something people would remember from the first one and would connect with the second one.”
Costner, who directed, co-wrote and starred in the film, has been working on “Horizon” for more than 30 years. The film’s release comes after Costner announced his departure from the hit series “Yellowstone.” Costner acknowledged that television was always the ultimate destination for “Horizon.”
“They’re going to split this into 100 parts, you know what I mean?” Costner said. “Once they do this four times, they’ll have 13, 14 hours of film, and then they’re going to turn it into a 25-hour TV show and do whatever they want with it. That’s the way we live our lives, but they’ll also exist in this form. And it was important to me to make sure that happened. And I’m the one who paid for it.”
