Movie Review: "Wind River" Is an Icy Murder Mystery Starring Two Avengers

Director Taylor Sheridan, writer of Sicario and Hell and High Water, treks to snowy Wyoming for Wind River, the third film in his loose trilogy of modern, grisly westerns.

Of course, it’s a ‘western’ in mood and theme alone, taking place in the icy upper parts of America; closer to Saskatchewan, Canada than Texas. But ‘eastern’ just doesn’t have the same ring to it.

This time, Sheridan steps behind the camera too and his unfussy direction is the kind a screenwriter would love. He gets out of his own way and lets the words, delivered by a decent cast, steal the show.

That said, there’s an absence of the audacious, dread-inducing thrill provided by Denis Villeneuve in Sicario, or the urgency of David Mackenzie’s bank robberies in Hell or High Water. Wind River’s action sequences don’t quite stand up to the same scrutiny. At least the dialogue pops. Plus, Nick Cave and Warren Ellis’ menacing score buries any flaws under fifteen feet of pure white snow.

Jeremy Renner stars as Cory Lambert, a hunter employed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Used to tracking animals in the wilderness, he unexpectedly happens upon the corpse of a shoeless young woman, Natalie Hanson (Kelsey Chow), deep in the lonely expanse of the Wind River Indian Reservation. How she got there—and survived in the cold for as long as she did—eats away at Cory, whose own daughter was similarly discovered in grim circumstances three years prior. When out-of-her-depth FBI agent Jane Banner (Elizabeth Olsen) recruits him for the investigation, he obliges. However, Jane’s unaware of the promise Cory made to Natalie’s father, Martin (the great Gil Birmingham): Find the person responsible for her death, and don’t let the law get to them first.

Wind River

Renner and Olsen, no one’s favourite Avengers, make for an appealing team here. As Hawkeye in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and whats-his-name in the Mission: Impossible movies, Renner’s barely left an imprint, but now he’s settling into a comfortable routine as decent (if a little off-kilter) men. Though, I wished Birmingham—who made an equally lasting impression in Hell or High Water as Jeff Bridges’ put-upon partner—had Renner's role, and given this otherwise diverse and fascinating look into the life of forgotten Americans the Native-American lead it deserved.

Olsen, doing the best acting-with-a-cold since Tom Hanks in Bridge of Spies, is nonetheless not as comfortable as Renner. Sheridan can’t decide if he wants Jane Banner to be a skilled and capable agent, or one entirely lost at sea, and the rudderless Olsen compensates by approximating panic attacks at every other moment.

Wind River is in many ways a movie about toxic masculinity, with the victim of a vicious sexual assault at its core, like a Yankee Top of the Lake. To that end, Jane doesn’t take kindly to all the mansplaining delivered by the local officers on the reservation (led by Graham Greene’s Sheriff). And yet, she needs all the help she can get from Cory. I enjoyed the dynamic between them, while still raising an eyebrow at Sheridan’s decision to literally give his heroic FBI agent a daddy.

If Wind River follows an overreaching cop in Olsen’s character, it’s mirroring the overreach of the director. Sheridan’s handling of the climactic shoot-outs (and one tormenting chase through the woods) is unconfident and staged unimaginatively. The sparks really fly in the stylised conversations, when everyone has something deep or funny or folksy to say; a turn of phrase or piece of local wisdom to impart.

Will that be enough for those hoping to see something that matches Sicario and Hell or High Water? Depends on which parts you preferred. This trilogy ends with a whimper, albeit a very watchable one.

3.5/5

In cinemas August 10. Rated MA15+ for strong themes, sexual violence and violence.