Event Horizon Revisited

Event Horizon (1997)

Directed by: Paul W.S. Anderson (as Paul Anderson)

Written by: Philip Eisner

Starring: Laurence Fishburn, Sam Neill, Kathleen Quinlan, Joely Richardson

I first saw Event Horizon around 15 or 16 years ago, and I remember having a pretty low opinion of it at the time, though I’d largely forgotten the specifics of why. My wife hadn’t seen it in roughly as long, and we’ve talked from time to time about giving it another shot. When it came up the other day as part of Josh’s 90s Nostalgia article, and a couple of people expressed their very, very high opinions of it, I figured that was a good enough reason to finally give it that long-awaited second look.

Basically, this is as lively and engaging as the characters ever get.

My opinion, I am sorry to report, is unchanged. It lived up precisely to my memories of a flat, graceless movie, populated by largely one dimensional characters spouting clichéd dialogue and revealing their minimal back-stories and over-familiar personality traits through blunt, inorganic exposition (is it necessary for a man looking at a picture of his dead wife to actually say “I miss you” aloud for the benefit of the audience?). It is a directionless narrative into which cheesy, ineffective jump scares and obnoxious, irrelevant stylistic flourishes have periodically been inserted in an attempt to mask the absence of any real tension.

Both the structure as a whole and the individual scenes are assembled with no sense of rhythm, nor with any attention paid to emotional through-lines. The sequence of events feels almost random, and characters act and change without any established motivation or clear external causes.

Dr. Channard from Hellbound: Hellrai – oh, wait, no, that’s Dr. Weir from Event Horizon. My mistake.

The nightmarish visions the characters experience should be the heart of the movie, but they are always too literal and obvious to be uniquely disturbing, and we have none of the emotional connection with the characters or their histories that would be necessary to give these sequences resonance.

The music is annoying and frenetic, with a tone better suited to a kid-oriented action spectacle than to atmospheric horror.

Everything is just too busy, almost impatient.  Images and concepts have been thrown into a blender, pointless camera movements banging up against hyper-active editing, every potentially effective moment buried in meaningless excess.

That’s Dr. Channard from Hellbound: Helraiser II. Much better!

What is so especially frustrating, though, is that the basic concept of the movie is sound. The same story, better structured, with more attention paid to the nuances and natural revelation of characters (not more time spent with the characters, but better time), could have been something really special. As it stands, it feels half-hearted, shallow and cynical. It explores none of the potential of its concept, instead only really addressing its already entirely apparent central premise as some sort of big third act reveal.

Hello, would you like some exposition… from HELL?!

Agree? Disagree?  Use the comments section below to make your opinions known!

Oh, and for more chances to talk about horror movies, be they brilliant, terrible, or anywhere in between, keep coming back to The Blood Shed, and be sure to check out our Facebook page and our Official Kickstarter!