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The Rural Roles and Small-Town Sagas of Kevin Costner [1]
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Date: 2024-07-25
Editor’s Note: A version of this story first appeared in The Good, the Bad, and the Elegy, a newsletter from the Daily Yonder focused on the best, and worst, in rural media, entertainment, and culture. Every other Thursday, it features reviews, retrospectives, recommendations, and more. You can join the mailing list at the bottom of this article to receive future editions in your inbox.
There’s no one in movies today who’s more associated with the spirit of the West, the quiet pleasures of a small town, and the sound of wind moving across the open range than Kevin Costner.
In their day, John Wayne, Gary Cooper, and a few others became symbols of the relationship between men and the frontier. Decades later, actors like Sam Elliott and Tom Selleck personified that bond, particularly in film adaptations of Louis L’Amour stories.
Costner has much in common with those actors. For most of his career, long before “Yellowstone” and the new film “Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter One,” Costner, now 69, has been drawn to roles that allowed him to portray that spirit.
An official trailer for “Horizon: An American Saga” (via Warner Bros. Pictures on YouTube).
After a series of small roles, Costner broke out as an exuberant young gunslinger in the 1985 Western film “Silverado.” Throughout the nearly 40 years since, he’s starred in romances and thrillers but returned, again and again, to Westerns and small-town set films about freethinkers in remote settings, from “Bull Durham” to “Field of Dreams” and “Wyatt Earp.”
In that regard, Costner is the modern-day model of the lonely frontiersman — probably more accurate to say lone than lonely — anchoring stories both small and epic of a man out there forging his own trail.
It helps to look good and authentic astride a horse too.
With “Horizon,” intended to be the first in a running saga, Costner returned to the epic Western following several seasons at the center of the hit neo-Western TV series, “Yellowstone.”
Paired with his 2003 film “Open Range,” “Horizon” represents the culmination of a screen persona developed across Costner’s long career.
On the Range
I’ve always suspected that directors and screenwriters appeal to actors longing for a throwback to traditional Western movies by including horseback scenes in films that aren’t set in that genre or era. The first such example that comes to mind is “The Untouchables,” starring Costner, of course.
Westerns ruled Hollywood for decades. Despite attempts to bring new life to the genre, as with “Silverado” in 1985, Westerns have taken a back seat to thrillers, sci-fi, and superhero sagas in contemporary cinema.
In the early 1990s, a few Westerns stood out as authentic new takes on the genre. Clint Eastwood’s “Unforgiven” in 1992 remains one of the most powerful Westerns ever and 1993’s “Tombstone” brought a stacked cast (including Sam Elliott) to an iconic story.
For “Open Range,” a few years later in 2003, producer, director, and star Costner recreated the lonely, independent saddle tramp hero, this time a sidekick to an older, more experienced cowhand — played by Robert Duvall in a performance that will remind some of his aging and ornery Texas Ranger Gus McCrae from “Lonesome Dove” (only not as overtly humorous).
Duvall plays “Boss” Spearman, an open-range cattle driver in 1880s Montana. Spearman and Costner’s character, Charley Waite, are driving cattle when they run afoul of Denton Baxter (Michael Gambon), a town boss opposed to cattle drives eating their way across his land. When Baxter strikes out at Spearman’s party, the cattle drivers come to town and meet Sue Barlow (Annette Benning), sister of the local doctor, who becomes Charley’s love interest. Robert Duvall, Annette Benning, and Kevin Costner in ‘Open Range’ (2003). (Credit: Buena Vista Pictures Distribution via IMDb).
For all that its name invokes images of sweeping valleys and cattle ranching, “Open Range” is an effective but somewhat claustrophobic story. There are certainly grand landscapes dotted with roaming herds early on, but much of the film takes place in a single town during a long storm that soaks the cowboys and their adversaries.
Duvall gets the lead billing here and he deserves it. It’s Costner, though, who ultimately faces the traditional cowboy movie choice: Ride the open range or settle down in a small town with the strong, beautiful female lead?
Over the Horizon
A lot has been made over Costner reportedly not continuing his role in “Yellowstone,” amid suggestions that shooting schedules between his films and the apparent final season of the series conflicted, that Costner and creator Taylor Sheridan clashed, or that Costner, approaching 70, was simply ready to pursue his own projects.
In any case, it’s “Horizon” that looms large, planned as a four-film series set across a 12-year period during and after the Civil War. It’s a time of great westward expansion and the film plays out in several states and unfurls storylines that symbolize the restlessness of the time, as pioneers push into Native lands and deadly conflicts break out.
A still from ‘Horizon: An American Saga, Chapter 1’ (Credit: New Line Cinema via IMDb).
At three hours long, the movie follows the migration of a group of Native people, a wagon train of white settlers, the fate of the survivors of a brutal battle that opens the film, and a change in fortune for Costner’s character.
Costner smartly knows he’s not young enough to play the sidekick anymore and here plays Hayes Ellison, an aging saddle tramp whose story is arguably not even the central one of the film. Costner doesn’t show up until about an hour in. It’s a testament to his star power that when he does come on screen, our attention is always riveted to his performance of a self-possessed cowboy who avoids conflict until he can’t.
Throughout the film, characters study widely distributed handbills for a town in the making called Horizon. The handbills hold the promise of a town that will offer a growing place for people to settle. It’ll be interesting to see who will make it to Horizon in future films, particularly since audience reaction and box-office receipts were not boisterous and might affect the status of forthcoming installments in the series. Will audiences and Hollywood have the patience to see this story through?
A handbill advertising the new town of Horizon, the focus of ‘Horizon: An American Saga’ (Credit: New Line Cinema via IMDb).
The movie has plenty of character and conflict but can’t help but feel like a prelude to the second film, which was scheduled to come out in August but has since been delayed, with third and fourth parts in the early stages of production. The final moments of “Horizon” do something I don’t think I’ve seen before: several minutes of footage from the second film are cut into a montage showing what’s next for the characters. On a related note, supposedly Costner ultimately intends to package all the films together as a TV series; meanwhile, Netflix is said to have made an offer to acquire the property in recent days.
For now, “Horizon” absolutely gets right the iconic look of the American West, with beautiful vistas dotted only by wagon trains and cattle drives. I wonder if Costner didn’t locate his story in so many spots on the map just to give us new establishing shots each time the setting changes. Whatever comes next, it’s very pleasing to the eye and mind.
Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 is currently playing in theaters and is also available as a premium rental on digital video on demand platforms.
This article first appeared in The Good, the Bad, and the Elegy, an email newsletter from the Daily Yonder focused on the best, and worst, in rural media, entertainment, and culture. Every other Thursday, it features reviews, recommendations, retrospectives, and more. Join the mailing list today to have future editions delivered straight to your inbox.
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