The 2024 romantic drama, adapted from Shannon Pufahl's 2019 novel, On Swift Horses, manages to tell a captivating story set in perhaps one of the most difficult times for the queer community. Sometime in the 1950s, Julius Walker returns to his older brother, Lee, after serving in the Korean War. There, he meets his wife, Muriel, and develops an unexpected and rather unusual bond with her. In short, On Swift Horses is a touching and enjoyable film, supported by both its narrative style and stellar performances.
On Swift Horses begins with Julius Walker arriving in Kansas, fresh from serving his country overseas in the Korean War, in search of his older brother, Lee. Based on letters Lee had written to him, he learns that his brother is now living with his girlfriend, Muriel, at her mother's house in Kansas. When Julius arrives there after days of hitchhiking, he meets Muriel. The two spend a good time alone together, getting to know each other, while Lee sleeps for hours. Aside from Lee, both seem to have a particular fondness for card games; Muriel prefers solitaire, while Julius readily calls poker a far superior game, and there is a strong connection between the two that grows stronger throughout the day.
Director: Daniel Minahan
Writers: Shannon Pufahl, Bryce Kass
Stars: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Jacob Elordi, Will Poulter
Things get a bit heated between the brothers that night when Julius informs Lee that he has been discharged from military service, even though they were both supposed to serve six more months. This means Julius won't even receive the severance pay and pension that veterans usually receive, which is significant because he and Lee had made a specific plan for this money. They had agreed to pool the severance pay and use it to buy a house in California, where they would start a new life together. But since Lee now has to contribute the money alone, he is furious with his brother, saying he always ruins all their plans, and Muriel has to step in to calm her boyfriend down.
Julius takes the opportunity to further seduce Muriel, and while they dance together, Lee returns and joins them to try something he's been wanting to do for a while. Lee is also a war veteran and is supposed to return to duty in a couple of days, and he doesn't want to risk losing Muriel. So he proposes once again, having asked several times before, since Muriel never responded. But something is different this time, especially when Lee promises that Julius will take care of her if anything happens to her in Korea, and Muriel finally accepts.
Six months later, Lee and Muriel, now married, begin a new life in California, where he works in a factory while she finds work in a coffee shop as a barista. Currently living a modest life, Lee dreams of owning her own home, which she's been saving for, but Muriel still believes they won't be able to afford it. Deep down, she still longs for Julius to come to California, as he had promised to move there and settle with them before leaving Kansas six months earlier.
From the very beginning of "On Swift Horses," there are clear indications that the bond between Julius and Muriel is romantic in nature, and that the two of them, along with Lee, are part of an unusual love triangle. To begin with, Lee is madly in love with Muriel and wishes to spend the rest of his life with her without question, and this has a lot to do with his personality. Unlike almost all the other characters we see, Lee is much more orderly on the inside, or at least pretends to be, and wants to follow social and moral conventions until his last breath. Nothing suggests that the man is faking or forcing his desire to live the American dream, as his only ambition, for the moment, is to own a home and raise a family. Therefore, it is no surprise that he remains devoted to Muriel, and has been since he met and fell in love with her, and his feelings for her are extremely genuine.
Muriel does love Lee, as she admits later in the film, and is apparently happy with him as well, but she seems to harbor a different longing that finds an outlet after meeting Julius. Lee may lack the sensitivity, accompanied by the sly wit, that Julius possesses, and this is what attracts Muriel almost immediately after meeting him. There is a clear attraction between the two characters, although it stems from a special feeling of complementing each other, albeit hypothetically, and not from lust. Muriel's love for Julius, as she admits to having fallen in love with him, is entirely emotional, and that is precisely why she is disappointed when he doesn't come to California to live with them. Similarly, she is also hurt and insulted to discover how Julius feels about her.
The two grow closer when Julius finally arrives at her new home in California a few months later, but they do not become physically intimate, as one might expect. Although they are sometimes seen holding hands, and there is also a kiss in the middle of the night, this last incident could very well be a product of the woman's imagination. Over time, Muriel falls madly in love with her brother-in-law, hoping for a romantic moment with him when he finally visits her. However, it is then that Julius surprises her by revealing his intentions, and the situation becomes even more complicated, as by then he has already fallen madly in love with her colleague, Henry.
Julius returns to his brother's house only to ask Muriel for money to go out in search of Henry, knowing that the special connection with his sister-in-law could be useful to him. It is quite possible that it is the longing to share that moment of intimacy, which is ultimately denied to her until the very end, that leads Muriel to dream of the kiss between her and Julius. If the man had stolen the money hidden behind the mirror, something he obviously knew, or even if he had left the house in the middle of the night, right after the kiss, the romantic moment would have seemed logical. However, Julius only steals the money Lee had been saving and leaves in the morning. Furthermore, one of the reasons he decides to stay away from the couple is undoubtedly to avoid any potential entanglement with Muriel that could harm her brother. Therefore, the kiss seems like something Muriel imagined, although it doesn't affect their fates at all.
Julius meets and falls in love with Henry through his job at a Las Vegas casino, where they are both in charge of monitoring players at the tables and notifying the authorities if they are caught cheating. But poker, and the game itself, becomes a crucial part of their relationship, to the point that it almost seems as if "Over Swift Horses" is trying to establish a connection between the two. At least for both men, taking control of a poker game, reading their opponents, and attempting to swindle them is almost like an outlet for their repressed desires and a sign of the risks they are willing to take in life, both for love and for their livelihoods. The 1950s were a particularly cruel time for the queer community in the United States, as they were not only looked down upon, but also fiercely hated and criminally prosecuted.
Thus, when Henry decides to make the first move, and he and Julius quickly fall in love and spend long hours together, he is just as likely to be persecuted as when he hatches the elaborate plan to rob the very casino where he works. Yet he decides to take this risk, driven by his belief that men like him need to snatch everything they desire. As with Julius's attention and love, he also trusts his gambling plan, even though it doesn't work. Interestingly, Muriel also enjoys gambling, and in particular cheating, as she bets on horse races based on inside information she overhears at the café. Both angles, along with the fact that Muriel and Julius discuss cards and gambling during their first meeting, suggest that "On Swift Horses" draws an analogy between gambling and the repression of love and queer identity.
For people like Muriel, it's already difficult to realize that their sexuality has been a secret to themselves, and then the confusion about what to do with this revelation or how to recognize socially and legally forbidden love takes over. Muriel finds herself trapped in such a situation, and it ultimately ends up hurting her, as well as the woman she has a connection to. Sandra, a neighbor in the new neighborhood Lee and Muriel move to, is queer and hosts get-togethers at her house to support her like-minded friends. Muriel ends up at her house during one of these get-togethers and lets Sandra make love to her after having developed an interest in her.
After learning of his wife's intimate relationship with Sandra, Lee does not confront her directly, despite being emotionally devastated by her infidelity. Shortly after, he sits down with Muriel and recounts an incident from his teenage years, involving a girl named Sally. Much to Julius's anger, Sally had suddenly ended her relationship with his best friend to marry a wealthier, more stable man, whom she had also been seeing for some time. His best friend knew about this infidelity but didn't care, feeling that Sally would always come home to him, no matter what he did. However, her decision to eventually leave him for her other lover, which enraged Julius, taught Lee a valuable lesson: accepting a partner's infidelity only leads to pain and heartbreak. At this point, Lee admits how heartbroken he already is and suggests that he cannot accept that his wife cheated on him, even questioning whether Muriel ever truly loved him. The truth is, Muriel's dreams are very different from Lee's, and it would only have been a matter of time before she decided to leave him, as soon as circumstances allowed.
One could even argue that she had been saving money for precisely this purpose, so that she could soon have her own life, one that didn't include Lee. However, after Lee poured his heart out to her, Muriel decides to leave him immediately, not out of resentment toward the man, but out of shame and a deep sense of pain for having hurt him in that way. That's why she also leaves a significant amount of the money she earned to Lee, knowing it will help him achieve his dreams.
In the ending of On Swift Horses, we don't see what happens to Lee after Muriel leaves, but considering his condition, he'll likely move to another city to start over. Hopefully, he'll be able to overcome this disappointment and perhaps even start a new family with someone more aligned with his dreams.
During the finale of On Swift Horses, Muriel visits the Chester Hotel and Bar, an establishment known as a safe space for queer people, and, fortunately, runs into Henry there. Henry's presence at the Chester Hotel confirms that, despite their previous misunderstanding, she has decided to forgive Julius and be with him again, which is why she has come to California to find him. After a conversation and a dance together, Muriel leaves after posting an apology note addressed to Julius on the board, which contains thousands of similar messages from lovers who separated only because their identities and romantic choices were not acceptable to society.
Incidentally, Henry also sees the note and leaves his own message underneath, apologizing to his beloved Julius and mentioning the name of a bar in the city he has decided to move to. When Julius finally arrives in California after his close encounter with a group of homophobes in Tijuana, he finds Lee and Muriel's house empty, after which he arrives at the Chester Hotel and Bar. There, he sees the notes in his name and immediately realizes that his two lovers are possibly waiting for him. In the final scene of "Running Horses," Julius rides out of town, and his destination is intentionally left vague to give the film an ambiguous ending.
Muriel is shown to have moved back to Kansas, where she now lives in her mother's house, which she didn't actually sell. Earlier in the film, she had given money to Lee and claimed to have sold her mother's house, but she had actually won it at the races. She is seen waiting at the door, likely for Julius, but she may suffer another disappointment in love. Based on all the decisions Julius makes throughout the film, it's most likely that she will go to Henry and reunite with him, deciding to live together despite not being able to make their love public.
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