‘Swift Horses’ is saddled with a lack of giddy-up
It’s hard to think of a less engaging movie than the gay period piece “On Swift Horses.” Not only does it squander an excellent cast, topped by Daisy Edgar-Jones and Jacob Elordi, but it also vastly underserves the LGBTQ+ community it seeks to champion.
Set amid a post-war landscape in which the American dream appears only achievable by straight white males, Bryce Kass’s adaptation of Shannon Pufahl’s novel is overly ambitious and underwhelming in its attempt to tell parallel stories involving closeted in-laws, each on a path toward finding themselves as people and sexual beings.
There’s no shortage of charisma from its two megawatt stars. Both bring their A game, despite being hemmed in by the staid tone director Daniel Minahan demands. Where there should be intense heat and unflinching desire, there is only tepidness and restraint, even behind closed doors. Both are closer to androids than humans, sheepishly yearning to love whomever they wish, free from society’s moral constraints.
Neither Minahan (“Deadwood: The Movie”) nor Kass (“Lizzie”) seem interested in venturing beneath the surface, content to merely remind us of what we already know: That it was risky to be queer in the 1950s. As if that wasn’t already obvious, they introduce a ridiculous gambling metaphor: the horses for Edgar-Jones’s Muriel and cards for Elordi’s Julius. The danger, we’re told, is that both could lose everything at any moment, including their lives. Stop the presses!
Even more baffling is the obscure nature of Muriel’s and Julius’s attraction to each other. They generate real heat in the precious few scenes they share, but the film does little to sort out their conflicted feelings. Are they sexual? Or, are they more founded on recognizing and finding comfort in a kindred spirit? Whatever it is, Julius’s brother and Muriel’s husband-to-be, Lee (Will Poulter), is outwardly oblivious.
Knowing his brother’s passions lie elsewhere, he pays little heed to the interlaced hands and intimate dancing. Nor does he notice Muriel’s unconcealed look of lust. Is this the behavior of “platonic friends”? Apparently, yes! And this is within hours of Julius arriving in Kansas to visit his brother, a fellow veteran, and meet his future sister-in-law. The visit is brief, but long enough for the trio to plot their post-war strategy of relocating to sunny Southern California and living the dream of wealth and success.
Jump ahead a few years, and things haven’t quite gone as planned. Lee and Muriel are now married and living in a cramped apartment near San Diego, while Julius has set up shop in Vegas, where he’s evolved into a card sharp and hustler.
This is where the gambling analogy manifests itself, with Muriel taking a job as a waitress in a greasy spoon conveniently patronized by vociferous tipsters with a knack for picking winning horses. She eavesdrops on their conversations, and sure enough, every tip she overhears improbably proves golden. Soon, she’s amassed a small fortune, never mentioning her good luck to Lee. Instead, she lies, passing off the $3,000 she fronts him for a new tract home in the burbs as proceeds from the sale of her late mother’s Kansas home, which she desperately wants to hold onto.
At the same time, Julius has found work watching for cheats at the blackjack tables in a Vegas casino, a job he shares with the Latin heartthrob, Henry (Diego Calva), who soon becomes his lover and roommate. Not to be outdone, Muriel finds a same-sex squeeze of her own in the seductive musician/olive grower, Sandra (Sasha Calle), although it takes what seems like forever for them to consummate their relationship.
It’s not a terrible set-up. The problem is that Minahan and Kass don’t know where to go with it once established. We get that Julius longs to be in a free and open relationship with Henry, just as Muriel does with Sandra. And we want it for them, too. But instead of examining their reluctant capitulation to the narrow-mindedness of “decent people,” Minahan and Kass slip into a repetitive cycle of you can’t always get what you want.
When events mercifully reach a long-delayed crossroads, the choices Muriel and Julius make are as uninspired as they are unsatisfying for us. In their dogged determination to deliver a happy ending, Minahan and Kass undermine what could have been a profound message.
This comes in the wake of what proves to be the film’s most compelling visual: a bulletin board in an underground establishment covered with photos and messages to lost loves, some of whom have sadly been disappeared. Talk about missing the lede! The aim is not to make us feel good about Muriel and Julius, but to implore us to consider the folks like them who fell victim to an era when fear and homophobia were at their peak. The image of a horse and rider galloping off into the sunset isn’t important. It’s the horses asses who prevented love, in all its incarnations, from winning out by placing all their bets on hate.
Movie review
On Swift Horses
Rated: R for nudity, some language and sexual content
Cast: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Jacob Elordi, Will Poulter, Sasha Calle and Diego Calva
Director: Daniel Minahan
Writer: Bryce Kass
Runtime: 118 minutes
Where: In theaters April 25
Grade: C-
