Unloved summer movies on Max — ‘Horizon,’ 'Watchers’

Kevin Costner knows how to tell compelling stories about the American West.

He might need to rethink the release strategy for those stories.

Credit the veteran writer/director/performer for keeping the Western drama afloat over the years with projects like “Dances with Wolves,” “Open Range” and his run on the wildly popular “Yellowstone” television series.

His latest effort, “Horizon: An American Saga” began this summer as the first part of a sprawling movie series. Unfortunately, “Chapter 1” opened poorly at the box office, leaving the already complete “Chapter 2” in release limbo. That second installment was supposed to open in theaters just a few weeks after “Chapter 1,” but Costner and Warner Bros. are seemingly hoping to build an audience in the home market before releasing “Chapter 2.”

Now on Warner’s streaming service, Max, the three-hour “Horizon” should at least reach some of the older audience Costner cultivated via “Yellowstone.” However, the structure of “Chapter 1” never builds momentum like a traditional movie, as the first three hours are spent introducing four major storylines. These individual stories *could* have been told as individual episodes of television, but even then, these introductory moments don’t yet establish a compelling reason to return to the characters later in the saga.

Though filled with a strong ensemble that includes Sienna Miller, Luke Wilson and Michael Rooker, Costner’s entrance into the story as horse trader Hayes Ellison provides “Horizon” with an intriguing central figure with the most potential, though Costner doesn’t appear for an hour and then appears in about as much screentime as everyone else in the ensemble.

Costner behind the camera remains a force, with the sprawling vistas and classic Western orchestrations providing the best justification for a big screen exhibition.

As it stands now, “Horizon” is disjointed and unsatisfying, which probably explains why Costner wanted to release “Chapter 1” and “Chapter 2” closer together. More context is necessary to determine if the story structure makes narrative sense.

However it comes about — either in theaters or straight to Max, “Horizon: An American Saga” — needs more fleshing out … as soon as possible.

A family affair

One of M. Night Shyamalan’s daughters played a major role in her father’s latest thriller (“Trap”). The other made her own directorial debut with the supernatural thriller, “The Watchers,” released in June. “The Watchers” underperformed at the box office and now hopes for a second life on Max.

Ishana Night Shyamalan effectively establishes a spooky atmosphere with “Watchers,” a story of a young woman (Dakota Fanning) who gets lost in an Ireland forest with a group of mysterious creatures. She meets a small group of other survivors in a bunker, where the creatures watch the humans through a mirrored window at night. Step outside in the darkness and you’re super dead.

For the first half of “The Watchers,” the mood and mystery has genuine potential. Unfortunately, the twists and turns in the second half fall into the kind of narrative traps that sometimes derails the elder Shyamalan’s work. Ishana Night Shyamalan’s screenplay here can’t overcome some clunky exposition and a predictable, tensionless climax. Once the movie leaves the forest in the last 20 minutes, “The Watchers” crumbles.

Hopefully Ishana Night Shyamalan will be allowed at least some of the leeway bestowed upon her father after he made a few poor screenwriting choices in otherwise slick-looking projects.

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Tyler Wilson can be reached at twilson@cdapress.com.

    This image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Kevin Costner in a scene from "Horizon: An American Saga-Chapter I."
  

    This image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Dakota Fanning in a scene from "The Watchers."