The Making of ‘Wild Horse Nine’ and the Story Behind It

Anyone wondering what ‘Wild Horse Nine’ is based on will find that the film traces back to its creator rather than to a book or a documented historical case. Martin McDonagh is credited as both writer and director, and the published credits name no source novel or true account. It is an original screenplay built around a real historical moment.

Shortly before the 1973 Chilean coup, CIA agents Chris and Lee are sent from Santiago to Easter Island by their bureau chief, MJ. That premise gives ‘Wild Horse Nine’ a precise historical frame while leaving McDonagh free to invent the characters, the mission and the tone that surrounds them.

An Original Screenplay From Martin McDonagh

Deadline reported that the project landed at Searchlight Pictures and first told readers about it, still untitled, back in 2021. The studio is the same one that backed McDonagh’s earlier awards run, which made it a natural home for his next original script.

Blueprint Pictures and Film4 produced the film, with Graham Broadbent, Pete Czernin and Anita Overland as producers. That team gave the project a stable creative base well before cameras reached the island.

Critics have placed the finished film squarely within the director’s established voice. Cineuropa described it as another classic McDonagh tragicomedy, this time with a heavier dose of geopolitical paranoia. The Aurealis Review noted that it reads immediately as a McDonagh film, especially in the shadow of ‘In Bruges’.

The Easter Island Inspiration Behind the Story

The setting appears to be where the idea began. McDonagh traveled to Easter Island years ago while looking for inspiration for his next project. He later told reporters at the Toronto Film Festival that the island’s qualities were essential to treating it as a character in the story.

A Rapa Nui travel site reports that the director had been interested in the island for years and that the mystery of the moai and the remote atmosphere helped him imagine a story set there. The same site connects the island’s Birdman tradition, a ritual tied to retrieving the first egg of the manu tara bird, to the film’s origins.

The production planned to begin shooting in March 2025 on Rapa Nui, which sits about 3,700 kilometres off the coast of mainland Chile. That distance helps explain why the story feels so isolated from the political events unfolding on the mainland.

A CIA Story With Present Day Echoes

McDonagh has been direct about his target. He said he wanted to make a pointed film about the CIA and the harmful things the agency has done around the world. The Easter Island backdrop lets him do that through two men who are far from the action but not free of responsibility.

The tone shifted as he developed the script. McDonagh said he realized the story could centre on one man’s guilt and regret over his past actions, which moved it from a simple comedy to something deeper and sadder. That man is Chris Carlisle, a veteran agent described as ageing, sarcastic and dying.

The director also sees a connection to the present. He said that watching the film now, it seems to comment on current geopolitics, and he expects audiences to react in interesting ways. For a period piece about a coup that is an unusually forward looking observation.

Venice Premiere Reception and Release Details

The film arrived at the Venice Film Festival with considerable momentum. Audiences there stood and applauded for thirteen minutes. John Malkovich won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor, while McDonagh was nominated for the Golden Lion.

Reviews have been largely positive, though not unanimous. Empire praised it as both very funny and quietly moving, and The Telegraph called it wonderful. RogerEbert.com gave it three and a half out of four stars. One dissenting review found the recurring dead horse motif too bluntly symbolic.

Searchlight lists a theatrical release of November 6 in the United States, and Australian cinemas will screen it from November 5 with a cast that includes Malkovich, Sam Rockwell, Steve Buscemi, Tom Waits and Parker Posey. The running time is listed at one hour and fifty eight minutes. If McDonagh really did dream this story up while standing among the moai, does knowing that change how you expect to read the dead horse imagery and the two agents’ fate in ‘Wild Horse Nine’?