The Pony Who Understood

Aim

Help us make The Pony Who Understood, a documentary about horses, neurodiversity and the unexpected places we find connection and belonging.

THE PONY WHO UNDERSTOOD

Sometimes the place you feel most understood isn't a place you'd expect.

The Pony Who Understood is a new documentary about horses, neurodiversity and something that touches all of us:

The need to belong and be understood.

Across the country, people arrive at equine centres for all sorts of reasons.

For an hour or two, something happens.

Parents talk. Children make friends. People who might otherwise never have met swap stories, laugh, listen, help each other or simply enjoy being somewhere they don't need to explain themselves.

And amongst all of them are the horses.

Then everyone goes home, back to everything waiting outside the gate.

But for those few hours, they've belonged to this little world together.

That's the world we want to film.

We're raising £10,000 to help us do it.

The Story

The idea for The Pony Who Understood grew from writer and presenter Craig Ryder's family experiences and a pony called Lili.

Craig has ADHD and horses have been part of his life since childhood. More recently, watching his autistic son form his own connection with horses made him begin to wonder what it is about these animals — and the environments around them — that can allow some people to feel more comfortable simply being themselves.

That became the starting point for the film.

But Craig's story is only the doorway.

We'll travel through Wales, spending time at equine centres and meeting people who find something there that can sometimes be difficult to find elsewhere.

We'll explore the relationships between people and horses, but also everything happening around them.

The conversations beside the stable. The cup of tea afterwards. The friendships that weren't planned and the familiar faces that you look forward to seeing again. 

Quiet moments where very little appears to be happening, yet something clearly is.

We'll also speak with specialists to explore why these environments can feel different.

We aren't going into this film claiming to know the answer.

We want to listen.

Why we need your help

We've developed the idea. We've built the team. We've started building relationships with the people and places that could make this documentary possible.

Now we need to put cameras in front of the story.

Our Crowdfunder target is £10,000, forming a major part of our wider £25,000 financing target.

Your support will help pay for filming days, crew, equipment, travel, contributor care and the post-production needed to turn what we capture into a professional documentary.

This isn't about buying fancy equipment.

It's about buying enough time with people to tell their stories properly.

Our first goal is to create a genuine proof-of-concept — not simply a trailer, but a real piece of The Pony Who Understood that allows people to enter this world, meet some of its community and understand what the finished documentary could become.

That becomes a powerful tool for approaching commissioners, broadcasters, documentary funds and partners.

Instead of saying:

"We'd like to make this documentary."

We can say:

"We've started making it. Come and meet this community."

This isn't about "fixing" anyone

The Pony Who Understood isn't about horses "curing" neurodivergence.

They don't.

And neurodivergent people aren't problems waiting to be solved.

Instead, we're interested in asking:

What happens when we change the environment instead of asking the person to change?

Perhaps sometimes people flourish because they've found somewhere with fewer expectations.

Somewhere communication happens naturally. Somewhere it's perfectly acceptable to spend ten minutes saying nothing at all.

And that's where this story becomes about more than neurodiversity.

Because almost everybody knows what it feels like to enter a room and wonder whether they belong there.

And most of us know the opposite feeling too — finding somewhere we don't have to try quite so hard to belong.

That's what makes this story universal.

Maybe you already know your version of this place

You don't need to be neurodivergent to connect with The Pony Who Understood.

And you don't need to know anything about horses.

Maybe your place is a football club, a theatre, a choir or simply a group of people who walk their dogs at the same time every morning.

Somewhere you arrived because of the thing...

...and eventually realised you were coming back because of the people.

That's the feeling we're interested in.

The horses are our way into it. Community is the story.

Who are we?

We're a small independent Welsh filmmaking team:

Craig Ryder — Writer / Presenter / Executive Producer
Craig and his family's experiences inspired the documentary and provide our way into its world.

Geraint Morgan — Director
Geraint will shape the film's visual and creative language and capture these stories with sensitivity and intimacy.

Rhydian Lewis — Producer
An award-winning Welsh producer of independent shorts and features, Rhydian will lead the production and fundraising.

We already have access to Hooves & Happiness, an equine centre in Wales, and intend to film across North and South Wales.

We're ready to start.

Join the Herd

There's something particularly appropriate about crowdfunding this film.

We're making a documentary about community — so we're asking a community to help us make it.

We have the idea.

We have the team and the access we need to begin.

Most importantly, we have people willing to let us into their community and trust us with their stories.

Now we need your help.

If this story means something to you, please donate if you can.

Share the campaign. Send it to somebody who loves horses, somebody who understands neurodiversity, or simply somebody who knows what it feels like to find an unexpected place to belong.

Because The Pony Who Understood begins with people and horses.

But ultimately, it's about all of us.

Finding somewhere we belong.

Finding people who understand us.

And perhaps discovering that the connections which matter most can begin in the most unexpected places.

It takes a herd to make a film.

Join ours.

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 26th October 2026 at 12:10pm