'Lean on Pete' review: There's a horse out there for all of us

And I'm ready to find mine. Someone buy me a horse.

Some boys like dogs. Some have cats (like yours truly), birds or fish. Some people really just aren’t pet-people. Then there's Charley. Charley, in A24’s latest film Lean on Pete, well...he likes horses.

With Avengers: Infinity War still cleaning up the box-office and Deadpool 2 and Solo: A Star Wars Story getting ready to make their big debuts in the coming weeks, Lean on Pete is a small little indie film that’s trying to sneak in-between all those blockbusters and build its own niché audience.

It deserves it. While not perfect, Andrew Haigh’s (45 Years, Weekend) Lean on Pete is a quiet, somber tale about a boy and his horse that’s probably going to leave a tear in your eye by the time the credits roll.

Charley (Charlie Plummer) is a 15-year-old boy living in Portland, Oregon. Charley’s mother ran out on the family when he was just 5 years old, so now he lives just his father, Ray (Travis Fimmel), in a pretty rundown house.

Ray, to his credit, is trying his best to be a good father to Charley. Problem is, in a way that reminded me of The Florida Project, Ray isn’t all that equipped to be raising a kid by himself and still has some growing up to do. There’s not a lot of money between the two of them and Charley is often left on his own — since a very young age — for long periods of time.

However, all they really have is each-other. Ray’s sister Martha (Rachael Perrell Fosket) left them on their own after the siblings got into a huge fight and now lives somewhere out in Wyoming. Now it’s just Ray and Charley living out in the American Frontier by themselves, taking the world one day at a time.

The lack of money is tough to deal with though, which is why Charley goes out looking for a job. He’s lucky enough to find one working as a stable boy for a grumpy old man named Del (Steve Buscemi) — despite the fact that Charley has never worked with a horse in his life.

That’s how Charley meets Pete. Pete is a 5-year-old racehorse who is quickly reaching the end of his career. And, as you might guess, the end of a career for a racehorse is a lot different than how we might celebrate someone’s retirement. A racehorse who can no longer race is given nothing more than a one-way ticket to Mexico, where the laws on animal slaughter differ than that in the states.

Charley and Pete bond quickly. He sees something of himself in Pete’s eyes, as the relationship between Charley and Pete embodies that of Ray and Charley in a lot of ways. When Del inevitably tells Charley that he has to sell Pete, Charley won't have it.

So he does what anyone would do in his situation — he steals Pete and plans to run away with him. What could possibly go wrong?

A lot could go wrong, and a lot does. The whole thing provides a coming-of-age journey for Charley that’s all told in a realistic and down-to-earth type of way. There isn’t any dramatic reveals or thunderous monologues that are forced in anywhere. It’s just a simple story that winds up leaving a much larger impact.

Part of that comes from the performances, as everyone who is cast in Lean on Pete is bringing their A-game. It’s easy to forget how good of an actor Steve Buscemi can be, given the amount of terrible Adam Sandler comedies he makes this day, but he can be quite good when he takes on serious, dramatic roles. In Lean on Pete, he’s almost unrecognizable at times — it’s only when the camera focuses on deep into his face that we see the real Buscemi hiding behind those hurt and stubborn eyes.

Travis Fimmel and Chloe Sevigny, who plays a jockey named Bonnie who rides Pete in competitions, deserve recognition in Lean on Pete because both of them nearly steals every scene that they’re in. Both of their characters are given such levity; they aren’t just simple one-dimensional people. Ray is loving but childish, Bonnie is warm but a realist. The result is an uneasy web that really captures the complication of the whole system.

Then there’s Charlie Plummer, who is getting all kinds of praise for his role. Plummer has been in a few movies before this — most notably, All the Money in the World — but Lean on Pete is going to be known as his break-out.

Plummer is great in the movie, but I’d be lying if I said his character was the most-developed that I’ve ever seen. That’s more of a problem with the writing, as all of the interesting components of the movie surround the people (or animals) that surround Charley rather than Charley himself.

Like, my favorite scenes in the movie were the “conversations” between Charley and Pete, or the dynamic between Charley and his father or Charley and Del. However, when Charley is simply on his own, the movie winds up being a lot less compelling — due to the fact that he’s written to be rather bland and stand-offish.

Luckily, the movie doesn’t rely too much on just Charley being Charley until about the last twenty minutes, with another character played by Steve Zahn (who gives a very Steve Zahn-like performance) shows up. Given that the movie is a bit too long for its subject matter, coming in over two-hours, Haigh should have considered removing this bit altogether.

However, Lean on Pete still packs an emotional punch that makes it a journey worth taking. I don’t think it’s going to reach my best of the year list at the end of 2018, but not every movie has to. This is just a well defined, sad story that’s going to make you feel all kinds of emotions.

Watch the trailer for Lean on Pete here and then let us know, in the comments below, what you thought of the movie!