


Paramount began the production by watching dailies, quickly printed footage shot each day to ensure everything’s going well, but when they kept seeing footage they liked, they eventually stopped watching. But with Anderson’s production running into its own logistical hurdles, not to mention Anderson’s insistence on directing second-unit footage himself, the editing process began to collide with the photography process, leaving Anderson and editor Martin Hunter only four weeks in the editing bay to try and hastily assemble together a first cut.Īnd this first cut left quite the impression. Thus, with a giant summer blockbuster-shaped hole on their hands - ironically, also about a doomed ship - Paramount asked Anderson to cut the post-production time of Event Horizon from the traditional 10 weeks to a compressed six weeks in order to make an August ‘97 release date. The studio was banking heavily on a little Cameron film called Titanic to come out the summer of ‘97, but as Cameron’s production was falling apart, so too did Paramount’s scheduling plans. According to several interviews and making-of documentaries on the recent Shout Factory Blu-ray, Paramount Pictures contracted Anderson to direct Event Horizon after the smash success of his Mortal Kombat adaptation, then smashed an impossible circumstance upon him, thanks to a cinematic jerk by the name of James Cameron.

Part of the mystique surrounding Event Horizon revolves around the possible existence of a longer, even more ultraviolent director’s cut. RELATED: 10 Box Office Bombs That Are Now Considered Classics Shortened Post-Production Schedule
