Two Bits & Pepper is a 1995 family dramedy film directed by Corey Michael Eubanks and starring Joe Piscopo, Lauren Eckstrom, and Rachel Crane.
[1] Two Bits and Pepper are horses, living in Central California with their owners, Tyler and her parents, Roger and Carla.
One day, after school, Tyler's best friend, Katie, sets out a plan to get her to ride Two Bits and Pepper into town.
Carla witnesses Tyler and Katie in a hang-out session with Two Bits and Pepper in town, alongside their best friends.
Earlier in the day, two crooks named Zike and Spider attempt to kidnap a young boy at school under the ploy that it's a free ride home.
Zike and Spider are pulled over by the police for matching the description of the car that the boy's father gave them.
At the same time, Two Bits and Pepper have escaped from their pins, walking through the fields to find Tyler and Katie with their telepathy.
Meanwhile, Zike is hanging out outside a trading post in town, begging a woman to leave her keys in her car.
Zike arrives with the stolen car and takes Tyler into it; they are gonna drive her to Mexico to sell her to a cartel.
Zike, Spider, and Tyler cross a railroad track, leaving Two Bits and Pepper behind.
Zike does not take too kindly of the act, letting Tyler pass by and cry with Two Bits as he's dying.
The police arrive at Two Bits and Tyler, leading to a large reunion with Roger, Carla, and everybody else.
Although the film did not fare well at the box office, it was among the first in a new trend of movie-style in the late 1990s, where an animal was kidnapped or injured by a set of two male antagonists, and it is up to the protagonist (usually a girl) to save it.
This was common in direct-to-video family films in the late 1990s, specifically ones released by Walt Disney Home Video.
Films like this included Gordy, Air Bud, and Soccer Dog, which was released by Columbia Pictures in 1999.