Event Horizon (film)
Encyclopedia
Event Horizon is a 1997 science fantasy
horror film
. The screenplay was written by Philip Eisner
(with an uncredited rewrite by Andrew Kevin Walker
) and directed by Paul W. S. Anderson
. The film stars Laurence Fishburne
and Sam Neill
. It was #1 at the box office in the UK.
that disappeared during its maiden voyage to Proxima Centauri
seven years prior. Captain Miller (Laurence Fishburne
) and his crew, Lieutenant Starck (Joely Richardson
), pilot Smith (Sean Pertwee
), Medical Technician Peters (Kathleen Quinlan
), Engineer Ensign Justin (Jack Noseworthy), Rescue Technician Cooper (Richard T. Jones
), and Trauma Doctor D.J. (Jason Isaacs
) are joined for the mission by the Event Horizon's designer, Dr. William Weir (Sam Neill
). Dr. Weir briefs the crew that the Event Horizon was built to test an experimental gravity drive
which generates an artificial black hole
to use the immense gravitational power to bridge
two points in spacetime
, greatly reducing travel time between astronomical distances.
Upon arriving at the ship's decaying orbit
around planet Neptune
and boarding the Event Horizon to search for survivors, the crew finds evidence of a massacre, and Justin is pulled through the gravity drive's core, returning in a catatonic state
. He's later placed in stasis
after a failed suicide attempt
in apprehension over the events he witnessed during his crossover. The crew begins to experience hallucinations of their fears and regrets: Miller sees a subordinate he was forced to abandon in a fire; Peters sees images of her son Denny, with his legs covered in bloody lesions; and Dr. Weir, a widower, sees his wife Claire with missing eyes, urging him to join her. After deciphering a warning from a video log of the Event Horizon's crew going insane and mutilating each other, Miller and D.J. deduce that while the ship's gravity drive did successfully open a gateway in spacetime, it leapt outside the known universe
and into another dimension, described later on by Weir as "a dimension of pure chaos, pure evil." In various manners throughout the film, this other dimension is heavily implied to actually be Hell
itself. The Event Horizon has since then returned with an evil presence and a life force
possessing telekinetic abilities, tormenting its occupants with the aim of compelling them to return.
Miller decides to destroy the Event Horizon despite objections from Weir, who is seduced and eventually possessed by the evil presence and uses an explosive device from the Event Horizon to destroy the Clark. Smith is killed in the explosion, and Cooper is thrown into space. Peters dies from a long fall after being lured into the engineering section of the Event Horizon by an apparition of her son. Weir kills D.J. by vivisecting
him and corners Starck on the bridge. Miller tries to rescue Starck but is caught by Weir, who activates the ship's gravity drive, initiating a ten minute countdown after which the Event Horizon and its passengers will return to Hell. Cooper, having used his space suit's oxygen to propel him back to the ship, tries to contact those inside, and Weir retaliates by shooting out the bridge window. Weir is blown out into space by the ensuing decompression while Miller, Starck, and Cooper survive and manage to seal off the bridge area of the ship.
Miller then resolves to detonate the explosives installed on the Event Horizon to split the ship in two and use the forward section of the ship as a lifeboat. He's attacked by the ship's manifestation of a scarred Dr. Weir, who shows Miller horrifying visions of the Clark's crew being tortured and mutilated once they return to Hell. Miller fights off the manifestation and manages to detonate the explosives, sacrificing himself so Justin, Cooper, and Starck can escape. The gravity drive activates, pulling the rear of the ship into a wormhole
. Starck and Cooper join Justin in stasis and wait to be rescued.
72 days later, the Event Horizon is located by a rescue party, who discover the remaining crew still in stasis. Starck has a nightmare of the scarred Dr. Weir being one of the rescuers, and is awakened in a distraught state by a rescue team. Cooper restrains Starck, and one of the rescuers calls for a sedative as the doors to the stasis room ominously seem to close by themselves.
pitched the idea for Event Horizon to Paramount Pictures
; he had no plot, he just pitched it as "The Shining
in space," which gained a positive reception from the executives.
After releasing the highly successful Mortal Kombat
in 1995 Anderson was offered the movie. The release date had already been set and Anderson agreed to do the film, despite that the deadline meant that the post production period was severely reduced. On the commentary Anderson cited this as the main cause for the many troubles faced during production and especially when Anderson was to make decisions on the final cut.
In the commentary Anderson mentions the wish he had to direct an R rated picture after the PG-13 rated Mortal Kombat and also mentions that he turned down the opportunity to direct X-Men
in order to make Event Horizon.
Anderson said that his initial cut of the film, before the visual effects had been completed, ran to about 130 minutes in length. The film was even more graphic in this incarnation, and both test audiences and the studio were unnerved by the gore. Paramount ordered Anderson to cut the film by thirty minutes and delete some of the violence, a decision that he regrets. Some of the lost scenes were offered as special features on the 2006 DVD but were taken from poor quality video tape, the only format in which the scenes now exist; the studio had little interest in keeping unused footage and the film has since been lost.
It was a box office flop, only recouping $47 million of its estimated $60 million budget. The movie went on to find a second life on DVD, and has since become a cult film
.
and Matt Stone
cite this movie as an inspiration for their Satan worshipping woodland critters who engage in gory acts and orgies in the South Park
episode "Woodland Critter Christmas
".
Science fantasy
Science fantasy is a mixed genre within speculative fiction drawing elements from both science fiction and fantasy. Although in some terms of its portrayal in recent media products it can be defined as instead of being a mixed genre of science fiction and fantasy it is instead a mixing of the...
horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...
. The screenplay was written by Philip Eisner
Philip Eisner
Philip Eisner is an American screenwriter best known for writing the screenplay for the 1997 science fiction/horror film Event Horizon, which was produced by Paramount and helmed by director Paul W.S. Anderson....
(with an uncredited rewrite by Andrew Kevin Walker
Andrew Kevin Walker
Andrew Kevin Walker is an American BAFTA-nominated screenwriter. He is known for having written the Academy Award-nominated film Seven , for which he earned a nomination for the BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay, as well as several other films, including 8mm , Sleepy Hollow and many...
) and directed by Paul W. S. Anderson
Paul W. S. Anderson
Paul William Scott Anderson , also known as Paul W. S. Anderson or Paul Anderson, is an English film director who regularly works in science fiction movies and video game adaptations.-Life and career:...
. The film stars Laurence Fishburne
Laurence Fishburne
Laurence John Fishburne III is an American film and stage actor, playwright, director, and producer. He is perhaps best known for his roles as Morpheus in the Matrix science fiction film trilogy, as Cowboy Curtis on the 1980's television show Pee-wee's Playhouse, and as singer-musician Ike Turner...
and Sam Neill
Sam Neill
Nigel John Dermot "Sam" Neill, DCNZM, OBE is a New Zealand actor. He is well known for his starring role as paleontologist Dr Alan Grant in Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III....
. It was #1 at the box office in the UK.
Plot
In 2047, the rescue vessel Lewis and Clark is dispatched to answer a distress signal received from the Event Horizon, a starshipStarship
A starship or interstellar spacecraft is a theoretical spacecraft designed for traveling between the stars, as opposed to a vehicle designed for orbital spaceflight or interplanetary travel....
that disappeared during its maiden voyage to Proxima Centauri
Proxima Centauri
Proxima Centauri is a red dwarf star about 4.2 light-years distant in the constellation of Centaurus. It was discovered in 1915 by Robert Innes, the Director of the Union Observatory in South Africa, and is the nearest known star to the Sun, although it is too faint to be seen with the naked eye...
seven years prior. Captain Miller (Laurence Fishburne
Laurence Fishburne
Laurence John Fishburne III is an American film and stage actor, playwright, director, and producer. He is perhaps best known for his roles as Morpheus in the Matrix science fiction film trilogy, as Cowboy Curtis on the 1980's television show Pee-wee's Playhouse, and as singer-musician Ike Turner...
) and his crew, Lieutenant Starck (Joely Richardson
Joely Richardson
Joely Kim Richardson is an English actress, most known recently for her role as Queen Catherine Parr in the Showtime television show The Tudors and Julia McNamara in the television drama Nip/Tuck...
), pilot Smith (Sean Pertwee
Sean Pertwee
Sean Pertwee is an English actor known for his television, film and voice-over work.-Career:In the early 80s, he auditioned for a place at the Surrey County Youth Theatre where he was cast as Captain Fitzpatrick in the play Tom Jones, based on the novel by Henry Fielding...
), Medical Technician Peters (Kathleen Quinlan
Kathleen Quinlan
Kathleen Denise Quinlan is an Academy Award and Golden Globe-nominated American actress, mostly seen on television and in motion pictures.-Personal life:...
), Engineer Ensign Justin (Jack Noseworthy), Rescue Technician Cooper (Richard T. Jones
Richard T. Jones
Richard Timothy Jones is an American film and television actor.Jones was born in Kobe, Japan and raised in Carson, California. He is the son of Lorene, a computer analyst, and Clarence Jones, a professional baseball player and the hitting instructor for the Cleveland Indians. He also has an older...
), and Trauma Doctor D.J. (Jason Isaacs
Jason Isaacs
Jason Isaacs is an English actor born in Liverpool, who is best known for his performance as the villain Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter films, the brutal Colonel William Tavington in The Patriot and as lifelong criminal Michael Caffee in the internationally broadcast American television series...
) are joined for the mission by the Event Horizon's designer, Dr. William Weir (Sam Neill
Sam Neill
Nigel John Dermot "Sam" Neill, DCNZM, OBE is a New Zealand actor. He is well known for his starring role as paleontologist Dr Alan Grant in Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III....
). Dr. Weir briefs the crew that the Event Horizon was built to test an experimental gravity drive
Faster-than-light
Faster-than-light communications and travel refer to the propagation of information or matter faster than the speed of light....
which generates an artificial black hole
Black hole
A black hole is a region of spacetime from which nothing, not even light, can escape. The theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass will deform spacetime to form a black hole. Around a black hole there is a mathematically defined surface called an event horizon that...
to use the immense gravitational power to bridge
Wormhole
In physics, a wormhole is a hypothetical topological feature of spacetime that would be, fundamentally, a "shortcut" through spacetime. For a simple visual explanation of a wormhole, consider spacetime visualized as a two-dimensional surface. If this surface is folded along a third dimension, it...
two points in spacetime
Spacetime
In physics, spacetime is any mathematical model that combines space and time into a single continuum. Spacetime is usually interpreted with space as being three-dimensional and time playing the role of a fourth dimension that is of a different sort from the spatial dimensions...
, greatly reducing travel time between astronomical distances.
Upon arriving at the ship's decaying orbit
Orbital decay
Orbital decay is the process of prolonged reduction in the altitude of a satellite's orbit.This can be due to drag produced by an atmosphere due to frequent collisions between the satellite and surrounding air molecules. The drag experienced by the object is larger in the case of increased solar...
around planet Neptune
Neptune
Neptune is the eighth and farthest planet from the Sun in the Solar System. Named for the Roman god of the sea, it is the fourth-largest planet by diameter and the third largest by mass. Neptune is 17 times the mass of Earth and is slightly more massive than its near-twin Uranus, which is 15 times...
and boarding the Event Horizon to search for survivors, the crew finds evidence of a massacre, and Justin is pulled through the gravity drive's core, returning in a catatonic state
Catatonia
Catatonia is a state of neurogenic motor immobility, and behavioral abnormality manifested by stupor. It was first described in 1874: Die Katatonie oder das Spannungsirresein ....
. He's later placed in stasis
Suspended animation
Suspended animation is the slowing of life processes by external means without termination. Breathing, heartbeat, and other involuntary functions may still occur, but they can only be detected by artificial means. Extreme cold can be used to precipitate the slowing of an individual's functions; use...
after a failed suicide attempt
Failed suicide attempt
Failed suicide attempts comprise a large portion of suicide attempts. Some are regarded as not true attempts at all, but rather parasuicide. The usual attempt may be a wish to affect another person by the behaviour. Consequently, it occurs in a social context and may represent a request for help....
in apprehension over the events he witnessed during his crossover. The crew begins to experience hallucinations of their fears and regrets: Miller sees a subordinate he was forced to abandon in a fire; Peters sees images of her son Denny, with his legs covered in bloody lesions; and Dr. Weir, a widower, sees his wife Claire with missing eyes, urging him to join her. After deciphering a warning from a video log of the Event Horizon's crew going insane and mutilating each other, Miller and D.J. deduce that while the ship's gravity drive did successfully open a gateway in spacetime, it leapt outside the known universe
Observable universe
In Big Bang cosmology, the observable universe consists of the galaxies and other matter that we can in principle observe from Earth in the present day, because light from those objects has had time to reach us since the beginning of the cosmological expansion...
and into another dimension, described later on by Weir as "a dimension of pure chaos, pure evil." In various manners throughout the film, this other dimension is heavily implied to actually be Hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
itself. The Event Horizon has since then returned with an evil presence and a life force
Sentience
Sentience is the ability to feel, perceive or be conscious, or to have subjective experiences. Eighteenth century philosophers used the concept to distinguish the ability to think from the ability to feel . In modern western philosophy, sentience is the ability to have sensations or experiences...
possessing telekinetic abilities, tormenting its occupants with the aim of compelling them to return.
Miller decides to destroy the Event Horizon despite objections from Weir, who is seduced and eventually possessed by the evil presence and uses an explosive device from the Event Horizon to destroy the Clark. Smith is killed in the explosion, and Cooper is thrown into space. Peters dies from a long fall after being lured into the engineering section of the Event Horizon by an apparition of her son. Weir kills D.J. by vivisecting
Vivisection
Vivisection is defined as surgery conducted for experimental purposes on a living organism, typically animals with a central nervous system, to view living internal structure...
him and corners Starck on the bridge. Miller tries to rescue Starck but is caught by Weir, who activates the ship's gravity drive, initiating a ten minute countdown after which the Event Horizon and its passengers will return to Hell. Cooper, having used his space suit's oxygen to propel him back to the ship, tries to contact those inside, and Weir retaliates by shooting out the bridge window. Weir is blown out into space by the ensuing decompression while Miller, Starck, and Cooper survive and manage to seal off the bridge area of the ship.
Miller then resolves to detonate the explosives installed on the Event Horizon to split the ship in two and use the forward section of the ship as a lifeboat. He's attacked by the ship's manifestation of a scarred Dr. Weir, who shows Miller horrifying visions of the Clark's crew being tortured and mutilated once they return to Hell. Miller fights off the manifestation and manages to detonate the explosives, sacrificing himself so Justin, Cooper, and Starck can escape. The gravity drive activates, pulling the rear of the ship into a wormhole
Wormhole
In physics, a wormhole is a hypothetical topological feature of spacetime that would be, fundamentally, a "shortcut" through spacetime. For a simple visual explanation of a wormhole, consider spacetime visualized as a two-dimensional surface. If this surface is folded along a third dimension, it...
. Starck and Cooper join Justin in stasis and wait to be rescued.
72 days later, the Event Horizon is located by a rescue party, who discover the remaining crew still in stasis. Starck has a nightmare of the scarred Dr. Weir being one of the rescuers, and is awakened in a distraught state by a rescue team. Cooper restrains Starck, and one of the rescuers calls for a sedative as the doors to the stasis room ominously seem to close by themselves.
Cast
- Laurence FishburneLaurence FishburneLaurence John Fishburne III is an American film and stage actor, playwright, director, and producer. He is perhaps best known for his roles as Morpheus in the Matrix science fiction film trilogy, as Cowboy Curtis on the 1980's television show Pee-wee's Playhouse, and as singer-musician Ike Turner...
as Captain Miller - Sam NeillSam NeillNigel John Dermot "Sam" Neill, DCNZM, OBE is a New Zealand actor. He is well known for his starring role as paleontologist Dr Alan Grant in Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III....
as Doctor William Weir - Kathleen QuinlanKathleen QuinlanKathleen Denise Quinlan is an Academy Award and Golden Globe-nominated American actress, mostly seen on television and in motion pictures.-Personal life:...
as Lieutenant Peters - Joely RichardsonJoely RichardsonJoely Kim Richardson is an English actress, most known recently for her role as Queen Catherine Parr in the Showtime television show The Tudors and Julia McNamara in the television drama Nip/Tuck...
as Lieutenant Starck - Richard T. JonesRichard T. JonesRichard Timothy Jones is an American film and television actor.Jones was born in Kobe, Japan and raised in Carson, California. He is the son of Lorene, a computer analyst, and Clarence Jones, a professional baseball player and the hitting instructor for the Cleveland Indians. He also has an older...
as Lieutenant Cooper - Jack Noseworthy as Ensign Justin
- Jason IsaacsJason IsaacsJason Isaacs is an English actor born in Liverpool, who is best known for his performance as the villain Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter films, the brutal Colonel William Tavington in The Patriot and as lifelong criminal Michael Caffee in the internationally broadcast American television series...
as Lieutenant Commander D.J. - Sean PertweeSean PertweeSean Pertwee is an English actor known for his television, film and voice-over work.-Career:In the early 80s, he auditioned for a place at the Surrey County Youth Theatre where he was cast as Captain Fitzpatrick in the play Tom Jones, based on the novel by Henry Fielding...
as Lieutenant Smith - Peter MarinkerPeter MarinkerPeter Marinker is a Canadian actor well known for his role as Kiichi Goto in the Patlabor series and his many audio book recordings. He currently resides in the UK.-Filmography:*A Wind Named Amnesia as Simpson*Angel Cop as Dr...
as Captain John Kilpack - Holley Chant as Claire Weir
- Barclay Wright as Denny Peters
- Noah HuntleyNoah HuntleyNoah Cornelius Marmaduke Huntley is an English actor, known for his role as Will Curtis in Holby City.-Background:...
as Burning Man / Edward Corrick - Robert JezekRobert JezekRobert Jezek is a Canadian film and television actor based in the United Kingdom.-Career:He is known for playing companion Frobisher in a range of Doctor Who audio dramas produced by Big Finish Productions and based on the BBC television series Doctor Who...
as Rescue Technician - Emily BoothEmily BoothEmily Katherine Booth , also known by her stage name Emily "Bouff" Bouffante, is an English actress and television presenter.- Early life :...
as Girl on monitor (uncredited) - Teresa MayTeresa MayTeresa May is an English glamour model.In 1997, she appeared in the music video for The Prodigy's single "Smack My Bitch Up". She moved into acting later in her career in B movies such as Exterminator City and One Man and his Dog....
as Vanessa (uncredited)
Production
To get back into work after a family tragedy, Philip EisnerPhilip Eisner
Philip Eisner is an American screenwriter best known for writing the screenplay for the 1997 science fiction/horror film Event Horizon, which was produced by Paramount and helmed by director Paul W.S. Anderson....
pitched the idea for Event Horizon to Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
; he had no plot, he just pitched it as "The Shining
The Shining (film)
The Shining is a 1980 psychological horror film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick, co-written with novelist Diane Johnson, and starring Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, and Danny Lloyd. The film is based on the novel of the same name by Stephen King. A writer, Jack Torrance, takes a job as an...
in space," which gained a positive reception from the executives.
After releasing the highly successful Mortal Kombat
Mortal Kombat (film)
Mortal Kombat is a 1995 American action and adventure film directed by Paul Anderson. Based on the Mortal Kombat series of fighting games, the film was the first part of the Mortal Kombat film series...
in 1995 Anderson was offered the movie. The release date had already been set and Anderson agreed to do the film, despite that the deadline meant that the post production period was severely reduced. On the commentary Anderson cited this as the main cause for the many troubles faced during production and especially when Anderson was to make decisions on the final cut.
In the commentary Anderson mentions the wish he had to direct an R rated picture after the PG-13 rated Mortal Kombat and also mentions that he turned down the opportunity to direct X-Men
X-Men (film)
X-Men is a 2000 superhero film based on the fictional Marvel Comics characters of the same name. Directed by Bryan Singer, the film stars Patrick Stewart, Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Anna Paquin, Famke Janssen, Bruce Davison, James Marsden, Halle Berry, Rebecca Romijn, Ray Park and Tyler Mane...
in order to make Event Horizon.
Anderson said that his initial cut of the film, before the visual effects had been completed, ran to about 130 minutes in length. The film was even more graphic in this incarnation, and both test audiences and the studio were unnerved by the gore. Paramount ordered Anderson to cut the film by thirty minutes and delete some of the violence, a decision that he regrets. Some of the lost scenes were offered as special features on the 2006 DVD but were taken from poor quality video tape, the only format in which the scenes now exist; the studio had little interest in keeping unused footage and the film has since been lost.
Reception
The film received several negative reviews, only receiving a 23% approval rating from Rotten Tomatoes.Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
It was a box office flop, only recouping $47 million of its estimated $60 million budget. The movie went on to find a second life on DVD, and has since become a cult film
Cult Classic
Cult Classic is a Blue Öyster Cult studio recording released in 1994, containing remakes of many of the band's previous hits.-Track listing:# " The Reaper" - 5:05# "E.T.I...
.
In media
Trey ParkerTrey Parker
Trey Parker is an American animator, screenwriter, director, producer, voice artist, musician and actor, best known for being the co-creator of the television series South Park along with his creative partner and best friend Matt Stone.Parker started his film career in 1992, making a holiday short...
and Matt Stone
Matt Stone
Matthew Richard "Matt" Stone is an American screenwriter, producer, voice artist, musician and actor, best known for being the co-creator of South Park along with creative partner and best friend, Trey Parker....
cite this movie as an inspiration for their Satan worshipping woodland critters who engage in gory acts and orgies in the South Park
South Park
South Park is an American animated television series created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central television network. Intended for mature audiences, the show has become famous for its crude language, surreal, satirical, and dark humor that lampoons a wide range of topics...
episode "Woodland Critter Christmas
Woodland Critter Christmas
"Woodland Critter Christmas" is episode 125 of the Comedy Central series South Park, and originally aired December 15, 2004. It is currently the last South Park Christmas theme episode.-Synopsis:...
".
External links
- Event Horizon at The Numbers
- Event Horizon at the Cinematic Intelligence Agency (thecia.com.au)
- Event Horizon at Planet Origo