A review by emkoshka
Event Horizon by Steven E. McDonald

3.0

A little while ago, my brother said Event Horizon was his favourite sci-fi horror film. While I love sci-fi, I could do without the horror aspect and so, squeamish scaredy-cat that I am, I decided to read this novelisation of the movie rather than watch the movie itself. Clever, no? The writing is pretty ordinary and actually a bit clunky to read, despite the words essentially translating what's on screen. I talk often of writing being cinematic in quality: writing so good that it evokes action and characters effortlessly in the mind's eye. Ironically, this prose was anything but cinematic. I didn't get a good sense of the characters' physical appearances and had to check IMDB to see who played who. I made a good call on not watching the film though. There was a good amount of psychological tension involved in the mystery and initial exploration of the 'Event Horizon', but when the horror did finally hit, it was pretty stock-standard and relentlessly gory and gruesome. I thought the actual explanation of the mystery was a bit ridiculous too: the ship went to hell via a black hole and returned with the devil on board?