On Swift Horses is full of lovely performances and is directed by Daniel Minahan with a sense of care. It is also a great reminder of the progress LGBTQIA+ members have made in the last half-century and how our society needs to keep progressing to become a more inclusive and accepting world. 

On Swift Horses is TV director Daniel Minahan’s debut film. Bryce Kass adapted the 2019 novel of the same name, originally written by Shannon Pufahl. This film follows Julius and Muriel, in-laws connected through Lee, as they discover who they are in the late 1950s. The film stars Jacob Elordi, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Will Poulter, Sasha Calle, and Diego Calva. The world premiere was at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2024, where it was acquired by Sony Pictures Classics. 

The film begins with Julius visiting Lee and Muriel in Kansas. They live together in Muriel’s house, which was willed to her after her mom died. Julius and Muriel meet for the first time, and there is an instant vibe. He teaches her how to play poker, and she clearly likes the risk involved with the game. As the three catch up, it is revealed that Julius has been released from the service early while Lee still has a few more months left. They planned to take the money they had made, move to California, and buy a house together. Throughout the evening, Lee, who has proposed to Muriel multiple times before and has denied him, asks her again to marry him, but this time, she says yes. Now, their two-person plan has become a plan for three. 

Six months later, Muriel and Lee move to San Diego, California, and immediately find jobs (what a dream!). She is a waitress, and Lee works in a factory. This is when Muriel and Julius begin writing letters back and forth to each other. He chose to go to Las Vegas, where he found work as a spotter for card cheaters at a casino. Muriel overhears the men at the restaurant talking about horse racing, which she bets on and wins money from. Not only does she like the rush, but this is also how they buy their dream house. She becomes infatuated with their new neighbor, Sandra (Calle), and they start an affair. Similarly, Julius falls fast and hard for his coworker Henry (Calva). Unfortunately, both relationships fall apart whenever their lovers’s desires become too great for them to bear.

As a longtime lover of Jacob Elordi, I am pleased to see my investment pay off nicely. Not only is he the standout performer of the film, but he is also a producer. Elordi charms as the free-spirited Julius. He perfectly plays the inner torment that his character struggles with. While Lee desires the stable family life he and his brother lacked growing up, Julius rebels against being in the box where he is expected to live his life. Elordi often plays untouchable characters or the object of attraction, but now it is flipped. Elordi does a brilliant job of showing Julius’s journey and how love changed him. And as for our female lead, Daisy Edgar-Jones is unsurprisingly good, too. Her ascension to stardom has been insanely quick. She only has 14 acting credits on IMDB, yet she feels like a fully developed star. Her role in On Swift Horses is precisely the kind of role she fits naturally into. Her inherently sweet demeanor lends itself well to the story. Just like Elordi, she is also a producer for the film. 

As for the supporting performances, Will Poulter is good, though he is given so little. Lee is a straight-laced, good man but a stick in the mud compared to the two people he loves the most. It is a thankless role, but Poulter pulls it off well. Between Warfare, Death of a Unicorn, and On Swift Horses, he’s the king of the first third of 2025. On the other hand, Diego Calva’s Henry is exciting and a risk-taker. Calva is good at playing an ambitious man, and he and Elordi have great chemistry. Finally, Sasha Calle rounds out this cast as the cool neighbor who has lived on the land all her life. While Muriel is just beginning to discover herself, Sandra is comfortable and knows who she is. Calle radiates the confidence Sandra needs. 

Overall, Minahan’s direction is nice and cohesive. He handles the editing back and forth between our two lead characters with grace, giving them relatively equal screen time and cutting back and forth where we can see how each story is lining up with the other. Also, he films the sex scenes respectfully but not without tension. The role these encounters played for their characters was vital to their arcs, and he handled them well. Between him and the casting director, they chose a crackerjack group of young actors for their roles. This is probably the highlight of the film. Everything seemed alright for most of the runtime, but I left the theater unsatisfied. 

The premise has much to explore, but the film only hits the major plot points and gives the characters little time to breathe. I struggled to find a website that gave me the full rundown of the book so I could accurately compare the differences. Since I haven’t read the book, I cannot attest to how much was removed or changed from the story, but my instinct signals there was more on the page. Elordi and Edgar-Jones do a lot of the heavy lifting to give their characters complete arcs, but what should be major turning points in their lives are moved through rather quickly. These characters have the potential to be compelling and multifaceted, but we cannot go in-depth on any of them the way they deserve. Lee, in particular, gets the short end of the stick. His relationships with Julius and Muriel are specifically interesting, but instead, he’s relatively flat. As for Henry and Sandra, we had to get an immediate sense of their attraction to Julius and Muriel rather than let anything build. 

Also, the type of relationship Julius and Muriel share is unclear. The trailer makes it seem like they hold feelings for each other, but that’s never addressed in the film. Is their vibe actually a mutual understanding of each other’s underlying queerness, or is it sexual tension? Could it be both? Their sexual preferences aren’t clearly defined in the film, so I could see it either way. It missed the mark if the first option was Minahan’s goal. Edgar-Jones and Elordi, unfortunately, have too much chemistry with each other. But if they are supposed to have chemistry, why tease the audience with something that never comes close to being or at least has a satisfying payoff?

Although On Swift Horses was solid, the film format holds it back from what could have been a unique work of art as a mini-series. Perhaps the ending would have been more satisfying had we spent more time with the characters and understood their psyches. Also, it would have given the story time to wrap up every character we would come to know and love. Although the writing holds the film back, On Swift Horses is full of lovely performances and is directed by Minahan with a sense of care. It is also a great reminder of the progress LGBTQIA+ members have made in the last half-century and how our society needs to keep progressing to become a more inclusive and accepting world. 

Grade: B-

Oscars Prospects:
Likely: None
Should Be Considered: None

Where to Watch: In Select Theaters