On Swift Horses Premiere’s at SXSW 2025

The closing night film at SXSW in Austin at the Paramount Theater on March 13, 2025 was “On Swift Horses.” Director Daniel Minahan (“Six Feet Under”) was present with cast members Daisy Edgar-Jones (Muriel), Diego Calva (Henry), and Sasha Calle (Sandra). Missing from the stage was the cast member most came to see, newcomer Jacob Elordi, who played Julius Walker, brother of Will Poulter’s Lee.

The  scripted line “He has passions of his own” (Lee to Muriel) is code for “my brother Julius is gay.”

And, as the plot progresses, we learn that Muriel, too, may be gay, although she may be more bi-sexual.

There is definitely chemistry between Daisy Edgar-Jones’ character and Julius when he shows up at the Kansas farm that Muriel has recently inherited from her deceased mother. Hopefully, the two will be paired again and we can see that chemistry play out. At the time, however, Muriel is being pressured to marry Julius’ brother Lee (Will Poulter), he of the ridiculously poufy blonde hair. A good guy, who is the Everyman American hero of the fifties with all the dreams and ambitions of the mainstream male.

LGBQT?

As a female appreciative of a young actor as good-looking as Jacob Elordi (“Saltburn”) it disappointed me that the sex scenes we were going to see the most of were  between Jacob Elordi and Diego Calva as Henry. To each his own, but the loss of some heterosexual love scenes between two such attractive leads as Daisy Edgar-Jones and Jacob Elordi was a big disappointment, just as Elordi’s absence from thc premiere was a let-down. A pairing between the two would be welcome in a future project where they had more screen time together and maybe even a romance, although a heterosexual romance doesn’t seem to fit the recent Hollywood trend.

There would be some less lengthy love scenes between Muriel and  Sandra (Sasha Calle).

THE BACKGROUND OF ON SWIFT HORSES

The book “On Swift Horses”, written by Shannon Pufahl, was the basis for this film. I get the distinct impression that I should go back to the source material to see how accurate the Bryce Kass screenplay was for this multi-layered novel.

But, as a woman who lived through this decade (the Eisenhower era), I feel informed enough  to comment on the societal repression it portrays. Women, in the fifties and sixties, were not allowed to have credit cards in their own names. We had to apply as Mrs. Wilson or, in this case as Mrs. Lee Walker to get a department store credit card. It was still illegal in San Diego to be queer until 1975, said Sasha Calle from the stage. Jobs of various sorts were not open to females (i.e., the high-paying ones.) It was “okay” to aspire to be a secretary, nurse, teacher or hairdresser, but no engineers, lawyers or doctors, with rare exceptions.

The screenplay by Bryce Kass tells us that Muriel’s mother was the first woman in Marshall County, Kansas, to get a car, the first to go to college, and the first to get a divorce. Perhaps Muriel’s blazing new life paths for herself isn’t quite as surprising after we learn that. There is also the put-down from Julius who said, “That sad girl.  She needs someone to tell her what to do.” Remarks like that would probably make today’s females mad enough to cut loose and attempt to do their own thing. As Director Minahan said from the stage “These are young people following their hearts and risking everything to be themselves.” Another documentary (about Sally Ride) playing here (and at Sundance), “Sally,” covered the same ground with a woman who was the first U.S. woman in space..

SEXUAL RELATIONSHIPS

Muriel marries Lee, but not very enthusiastically.  There is repressed sexual tension between Muriel and Julius as soon as he shows up at the couple’s home. (If only that had been let play out a bit more.) The dancing scenes were promising.

Will describes his brother as “He gets to live his life like there’s no tomorrow.” Basically, it means, as one other scripted line would have it, that he ends up  a thief, a faggot and alone.”  It does seem that Julius really wants to have a meaningful relationship with Henry (Diego Calva), harkening back to films like “Brokeback Mountain.” In fact, in the latter half of the 1 hour and 59 minute film, Julius is looking for Henry in Tijuana and putting his life in danger doing so

One performer who stood out to me was Sashe Calle as Sandra. Her onscreen performance as a sexually liberated lesbian bombshell was palpable. Sashe referred to the cast as “young, attractive and cool.” She was not wrong.

DIEGO CALVA DURING THE Q&A

Diego Calva told the audience during the Q&A that he was not sure, at first, that he was the right choice for Henry, but Director Minahan sat him down and said, “You’re Henry. Be brave.” Calva (“Babylon”) was brave (as was Elordi). However, I’m still regretting the failure to provide equal time for an Elordi/Edgar-Jones hook-up. (Different strokes for different folks.) The sexual tension was there and it would be nice to see the two paired again. Another critic mentioned some patrons walking out of a sneak showing at the Palm Springs Film Festival, as the true topics of the plot were kept hidden, for the most part. Lots of talk about “young people finding themselves” concealed the homosexual and lesbian sex scenes that develop the plot’s main topic of Eisenhower era repression of gays, lesbians, and women, in general.

I had more difficulty with the Elordi/Calva relationship. It was not because it was a homosexual relationship. It was because I had a hard time understanding much of Diego Calva’s dialogue and some of Jacob Elordi’s. I asked others if they found the Hispanic accent easy to understand and my seatmates echoed this thought. On the other hand, I was impressed with how well Daisy Edgar-Jones, born in 1998 in London, handled her American Midwestern accent. She has a Scottish father and a grandfather from Northern Ireland who lived in her home of origin briefly, but her Midwestern Kansas accent sounded authentic. Both Edgar-Jones and Sasha Calle were impressive in their parts.

THINGS THE PERIOD PIECE GOT RIGHT

I lived through the fifties, a time when a married woman couldn’t get a credit card in her own name, but had to apply as (in this case), “Mrs. Muriel Walker” or “Mrs. Lee Walker.” A good friend of mine, a single teacher buying her first home, was truly irritated when she was listed as “a spinster” on the paperwork. (She was in her twenties at the time, but single.) Women were frowned upon in the professions. It was “okay” to be a secretary, a nurse, a teacher, or a hairdresser, but it was not okay to be an engineer, a doctor or a lawyer.

The phrase “second class citizens” might be considered accurate for women in the 1950s and beyond. Yes, there were the occasional trail-blazers like Ruth Bader Ginsberg, but I’m talking about the majority of women. The pill did not really become available until the early sixties, so women were trapped by their biology and by the mores of  society, which frowned on divorce and barely even had terms for women attracted to their own sex. Transgender did not appear until much later, and, under the current administration, it has become a touchstone of the GOP power to belittle the entire concept.

One thing that  was accurate: everybody smoked.

The un-sexy boxy female underwear of the era: accurate.

The Zenith radio and “The Rifleman” on TV: true to the times.

Great cinematography (Luc Montpellier).

HORSES

Julius is a gambler, and Muriel becomes one betting on the ponies (and winning). There is also a horse that Julius wins in a poker game and takes to his brother Lee’s house, thinking that he lives on a ranch. Lee corrects Julius. He  had said the couple had built a ranch house. The horse seems to be kicking around in the backyard for the rest of On Swift Horses.  I wondered how one could ride a horse from San Diego to Kansas, but nevermind about that. Jacob Elordi looks good on a horse, sprawled on the hood of a car (shirtless), in a sailor uniform or lazing about in his underwear. He even looked good dead (“Saltburn”).

CONCLUSION:  If you are an open-minded person who accepts same sex (and opposite sex) relationships without condemnation or moral judgment, as I am, but you are straight, you will probably regret not having more of the Elardi/Edgar-Jones chemistry explored onscreen. However, the attempt to “really honor the performances and approach every scene with simplicity and integrity” worked. The cinematography from Luc Montpellier and the period music, costumes and sets were top-notch. On Swift Horses opens in theaters on April 25th, a Sony production.