Review of Wind River (2017) by Spangle — 19 Aug 2017

Few writers have been in a better position to express their voice so clearly than Taylor Sheridan. While just his second directorial effort, Sheridan's voice was brought to life in both Sicario and Hell or High Water to the point that it feels as though both were directed by him. However, in seeing Wind River, the first film he wrote and directed (his debut Vile was just directed by him), it is clear that he does benefit from working with better directors. While Sheridan capably directs the film's strong script, it remains true that in the hands of somebody better, Wind River could have been a classic. As it stands, it is instead a pretty good film with great ideas on its mind that it handles far too bluntly at times. A thrilling and sorrowful film about a murder on an Indian reservation, Wind River works, but not to the degree that it should have, leaving it as a good but disappointing work.

In both Sicario and Hell or High Water, it became clear that Sheridan's thematic focus was upon the disenfranchised. In the former, he focused on those living under the thumb of the Cartel in both Mexico and across the border in America. In the latter, he focused upon those left behind in the dust by the financial collapse in the late 2000s. Now, in Wind River, he turns his focus on a group of people all Americans have contributed to the demise of: Native Americans. With a Native American girl, Natalie Hanson (Kelsey Chow), found dead on the reservation by wild life and game tracker Cory Lambert (Jeremy Renner), the murder serves as merely a gateway into the life on the reservation. For FBI agent Jane Banner (Elizabeth Olsen), this functions as if it were another world. Completely isolated and on their own without back-up, the tribal police run by Ben (Graham Greene), operates across a territory the size of Rhode Island with just six officers. With such little police presence, no opportunity for advancement via education or jobs, and readily available drugs and alcohol, the Wind River Indian Reservation is the quintessential depiction of life for Natives in America right now. With missing Native girls reaching astronomical figures, alcoholism running rampant, and drug use throughout, Wind River calls attention to the issues facing Natives in a searing, depressing, and realistic depiction. When handling these issues, Sheridan does so beautifully and skillfully, burying them within average conversations between Cory and men believed to be somewhat connected to the murder. In every home on the reservation, demons reside and it is best to pretend that they are not actually there.

Found six miles from the nearest building, Sheridan's ability to use the death of Natalie as a metaphor and symbolism for the life of Natives is perhaps the film's most impressive aspect. Dying not from being raped or killed, but from having her lungs explode due to the cold weather, Sheridan subtly and smartly depicts how the land has even turned against Natives after all these years. Through the turmoil and strife thrust upon them by the whites and their arrival in the Americas, Natives could always count on the lands to sustain them in their time of need. However, with such little territory and animals such as the bison leaving Indian reservations, the staples of Native American life have left them in the lurch to the point that they have nothing to do and are without hope. What were once proud people have been left destitute through their interactions with whites and through the changing of times as crops die and animals leave. While whites led them to their grave with a gun to their head, the land is truly what nailed the final nail in the coffin of Natives in America with the land no longer being sustainable. However, while the situation is hopeless and destitute - just as the one faced by Natalie with her having to run six miles barefoot just to get where she was, which was nowhere - this race of people that have been in the Americas for thousands of years refuse to give up and will fight until their dying breathe.

Sheridan, in the course of depicting how the land and circumstance is truly what is killing Native Americans, refuses to let whites off the hook. At the end of the day, the only reason Natives are in this situation to begin with because of whites. It is a central argument in the film that it is impossible to define. With the case of Natalie, she was clearly led to run in the snow by some malevolent force that is certainly guilty of homicide. However, the coroner cannot give the cause of death as homicide, as she died because of her lungs exploding. While it is true that it should be considered a homicide, that is not her cause of death.