Director Daniel Minahan Unpacks Muriel And Julius’ Attraction To Each Other In On Swift Horses [TIFF]

From director Daniel Minahan, On Swift Horses premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on Saturday, September 7. It is based on Shannon Pufahl’s 2019 novel of the same name and takes place in 1950s America. The story follows newlyweds, Muriel and Lee, who move to San Diego to start a new life. Meanwhile, Lee’s brother, Julius, returns from the Korean War and finds himself doing pit surveillance at a casino in Las Vegas. Through a surprising series of events, Muriel and Julius end up on similar, yet dangerous, journeys that bring them together in a way they don’t expect.

On Swift Horses has an all-star ensemble, with Daisy Edgar-Jones, Jacob Elordi, Will Poulter, Diego Calva, and Sasha Calle making up the main cast. Minahan, who also serves as a producer of the film, shares that he was attracted to Pufahl’s original story because it doesn’t have a traditional antagonist. The director believes the true obstacle is Muriel’s and Julius’ struggles to be their authentic selves, despite what it means for those around them. Minahan embraced the challenges that came along with adapting the book and says he is proud of the final product.

Screen Rant interviewed Minahan during the Toronto International Film Festival about Muriel and Julius’ dynamic in On Swift Horses, the significance of the nuclear bomb scene, and bringing 1950s America to life.

Minahan Believes Muriel and Julius’ Affection For One Another Is Unique

“I think they really complement each other, and it’s the kind of attraction and affection that I haven’t seen dramatized before.”

Screen Rant: Can you talk a little bit about Muriel and Julius’ attraction for each other and how they serve as foils when searching for their own version of the American Dream?

Daniel Minahan: I think, first and foremost, this is a movie about desire, and these two characters, Muriel and Julius, meet each other, and they’re instantly attracted to each other. We don’t know whether it’s love, sexual attraction, affection. And as the film goes on, I think we start to realize that they really recognized each other. They recognize something in each other. They’re both outsiders, they’re both watchers, and as we begin to get to know them better, we realize that they’re both trying to find their true selves and exploring the queer underworld of Vegas and San Diego.

And I think that is one of the big connections between the two of them, is that they both see each other and they enter each other’s lives. They have this affection, and they change the direction of each other’s lives. I think Muriel is in love with the idea of Julius’ freedom. And I think Julius is in love with the idea of belonging somewhere, which is what Muriel has. So I think they really complement each other, and it’s the kind of attraction and affection that I haven’t seen dramatized before. That’s what really attracted me to this novel and adapting this novel.

We have to talk about the nuclear bomb scene. What does that mean symbolically for the story and for the characters?

Daniel Minahan: I think the scene where Henry takes Julius out into the desert for a party to watch the government detonate nuclear bomb is one of the most romantic dates I could ever imagine. It also puts us firmly in the time period when Nevada, besides being this outlaw beginning of Vegas, is also this sort of fringe of America where they’re testing nuclear bombs. So it operates on a lot of levels, and it’s also just incredibly romantic and a great metaphor for these people blowing up their lives to be together.

On Swift Horses is your first major motion picture, but you’ve directed brilliant episodes of television. I’m curious what the transition was like from the economical process of shooting television to an epic romance like this.

Daniel Minahan: I have made a few films, not as well known. I wrote a film called I Shot Andy Warhol, which became a feature, this was many years ago, and then a film called Series 7. Series 7 was a film about—imagine a TV series where people were followed as they murder each other and fight for their own survival. Then that kind of brought me into the world of HBO, where Six Feet Under was sort of a cult film in the writers room. That brought me into HBO, and I got to work with a lot of really great writers, and I stayed there.

I came from a documentary background, and I’d been a journalist before, so it was really a big learning experience for me, working in series. And when you work in series, you oftentimes come in, you do an episode, and you leave, and there’s someone else who’s really responsible for the full arc of the season, and they’ve already kind of created a look. In the last 10 years, I’ve been working as a producer and really setting series. I’ve been producing series and directing, but I’ve been having the opportunity, for example, with Halston, I directed the entire thing, and I kind of think of it as a six-hour movie.

It’s a very different experience. It’s like the difference between writing a novel and a short story. Series are more novelistic in that they go and go and go, and they’re episodic, and you can explore more detail on things. In a feature, you have to be very succinct and very specific about the story you want to tell and really tie it all up the way you would a short story. So I enjoyed it very much. It was a very positive experience for me, and I’m so proud of what I was able to do with my collaborators on this.

Finding Locations Was A Major Challenge When Filming On Swift Horses

“You really had to be inventive. You really had to find great locations that were going to serve for a lot of different things.”

What was the most challenging part about bringing 1950s America to life?

Daniel Minahan: I’d say the whole thing was a challenge. It was very ambitious. We were exploring, we were setting stories in world building in about five different worlds: Kansas, San Diego, Las Vegas, and Tijuana. You really had to be inventive. You really had to find great locations that were going to serve for a lot of different things, and I relied on my great art department and my cinematographer to really put it across. I’d say that was one of the biggest challenges. And the other thing, which was a great challenge, but it was one of the things that attracted me to this story is, On Swift Horses doesn’t have a traditional antagonist.

I think in other 1950s stories about someone coming of age or a clear coming out story, there would be this very clear antagonist, which would be the husband, his disapproval, and his abuse. But we had a great character who was very gentle and very loving and just wanted to create a family with these two people who he loved very much, and unfortunately, he was in the way. I think the antagonist in this piece really became the struggle that Muriel and Julius had to be their authentic selves and knowing that they were going to hurt other people like Muriel’s husband along the way.

Muriel and Julius almost switch places halfway through the movie. Muriel gets riskier while Julius wants to play it safe with Henry. Do you think these are their innate desires, or is it that they’re searching for the other in themselves?

Daniel Minahan: I think Julius had been living on the fringes and living a dangerous unchecked life for a long time, and here was this opportunity for him to go and make a home with his brother and Muriel. He knew in his heart, because of who he was, that he couldn’t do that. And so I think he found Henry and thought that would be the person that he can make a home with and find a place to belong. And Muriel learns the cost of freedom. I think Muriel conflates this idea that, if she collects all this money, she wins at the track, she becomes this autonomous person, that she’ll be happy.

And what she learns is that she’s hurt a lot of people along the way, but I feel like she ends in a really good place. She goes back home. Throughout the film she said, “I like the country.” She says to Sandra, “So you live here alone?” She meets this woman who lives without a man, and then she says to Sandra, “You’re not afraid of being alone, are you?” I think Muriel comes to this place of self-realization, but through a lot of experimentation. Will she end up with Sandra later? I like to think that they make amends and they get together. I think they had such a great chemistry.

About Daniel Minahan’s On Swift Horses

“A story about risking everything for love, only to gain self-knowledge along the way.”

It’s the 1950s. Newlyweds Muriel (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and Lee (Will Poulter) leave their Kansas home for a new life in San Diego, with steady jobs and a house they can start a family in. Lee’s brother Julius (Jacob Elordi, also at the Festival in Oh, Canada), meanwhile, returns from the Korean War without any long-term plans.

A deft hand at poker, he winds up in Las Vegas, where he does pit surveillance at a casino and befriends Henry (Diego Calva, TIFF ’15’s Te prometo anarquía), a handsome Chicano who, like Julius, loves a good gamble. All this time, Muriel and Julius correspond, though neither realize how much they have in common. Bored with waiting tables, Muriel secretly begins playing the horses — and winning. What’s more, Muriel and Julius find themselves on parallel journeys involving clandestine transgressions that could place them in greater danger than either bargained for.

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On Swift Horses premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 7.