Review of Wind River (2017) by Anthony S — 30 Aug 2017

What a remarkable movie. Very powerful and truly intense film. This movie is brutal, unrelenting, heart-wrenching, dark, borderline disturbing (all aspects used in a positive good way), and one of the most chilling and suspenseful murder mystery movies I've ever seen. The fact that this film is based on true events makes it all the more amazing and profound how superb a production this film was to see in the theater.

As the movie developed, I became so emotionally invested in the main characters. The storytelling, screenplay flow, cinematography, and pacing were almost flawless. Jeremy Renner gives his BEST acting performance to date. Very understated, very layered, yet very REAL performance. He deserves yet another Best Actor award nomination at the both the Golden Globes and Oscars next year for this SUPERB portrayal of the lead character. The other supporting acting performances from Gil Birmingham and Graham Greene were also very well done and pitch perfect.

The one slight "weakness" in this movie is Elizabeth Olsen's role. She gives an overall admirable performance as the rookie young FBI agent, but there are some scenes she felt out of place and a "fish out of water". I think a slightly older and mature actress may have fit this role better overall. Her performance was good, but just not at the high level of excellence like the rest of the cast.

Overall, this is up there as one of the BEST and astonishingly magnificent movies I've seen this year. Along with "Dunkirk", I can see "Wind River" receiving multiple Oscar and Golden Globe nominations next year.