Wind River (2017)

If you're outside of the UK you may have something similar, but here Odeon cinemas runs something call Screen Unseen. It's £5 a ticket and it's a guaranteed preview. I've been to a few now and they're always great films and this was no exception. I hadn't heard much about this in the UK but saw a trailer months ago when I was in Canada. The trailer seems somewhat intriguing, didn't give much more than, a body was found in the snow, whodunit. I personally thought the way they showed some of the Native American traditions seemed a little cliche in the trailer but this was thankfully not the case in the film. 

Jeremy Renner plays Cory Lambert, a wildlife service agent who finds the body of a teenage girl barefoot 6 miles from the nearest lodge. The mystery of potential murder and rape bares the right for an FBI agent, Jane Banner, Elizabeth Olsen, to investigate. She relies on Lambert who knows the land and the people to put more peices together. It was great to see the two of them together outside of Marvel, they're good and they bounce off of each other well. Renner handles his character well, he's a divorced father who's lost one of his children, its a heavy role to play but it all comes out gradually. Good development for him and same for Banner, we aren't given the same character history but you don't always need every chapter to know the person and we get to know her well enough without. 

The rest of the cast was great a lot of familiar faces, for some reason there doesn't seem to be many Native American actors in big features, Gil Birmingham being the one of the most recognisable. A lot of new faces as well as surprise appearance from someone I didn't know was featured, I won't give away any names but it's a great scene.


Sound is something and nothing, was used well with some scenes with gunshots, you won't miss those. And of course uses the silence of the snow where they can. Being set on a reservation in Wyoming it's pretty hard for it too look bad. Snow is always easy to shoot right? Great landscapes, great wide shots. The use of animals is symbolic as they often are. Renner's character is a hunter and in the opening shot you see him hunting a wolf, immediately showing his behaviour with predators. The next prey he's hired to find is a mountain lion, turns out it's a family with two cubs and we get a gorgeous shot of them and again it hints at the bigger picture. His job is to eliminate predators for the greater good and that he does. 

As Renner and Olsen figure out the crime and the culprit we get a head strong flashback of what actually happened. Knowing how things turn out in an uncomfortable scene makes it more uncomfortable. Knowing the awful fate of the character just fills you with dread, you're waiting to see something you don't want to see. It's a great scene, well placed in the story, well portrayed by all cast included. And unfortunately it's almost satisfying to see something awful happen because it confirms the mystery. Then after that follows apt justice which is then genuinely satisfying. 

I think the pacing was a little off, but the subject matter and frankly the location I think eases that. There is a chunk of not much going on, in some parts it feels a bit dragged. Which I honestly think the story gives some allowance to. It adds to the boredom some of the people feel, the long days filled with nothing and nothing around them. That being said it doesn't excuse it completely. There's some great tension but it's not always consistent. 

Definitely worth the watch, performances are great, the ending leaves you appeased yet uneasy 7/10

CINEMATES - A