Wind River review: Don’t be a sucker for the American nightmare

Jeremy Renner's a fine actor, writes Charlotte O'Sullivan, but his character looks like wannabe James Bond and talks like a fortune cookie
Charlotte O'Sullivan15 November 2017

This Wyoming-set crime thriller got the thumbs-up at Cannes (where it won the Un Certain Regard mise-en-scène prize). European film buffs have a weakness for solemn US whodunits. Violated minors; a man’s quest for justice; a wacky soundtrack from Nick Cave and Warren Ellis. Wind River ticks all the right boxes. It also leaves a bad smell.

Cory Lambert (Jeremy Renner) hunts wolves on an Indian reservation but is happy to help rookie FBI agent Jane Banner (Elizabeth Olsen) investigate the death and rape of Native American teen Natalie (Kelsey Asbille). Cory and his ex-wife (also Native American) knew the girl. Before their own daughter was murdered she was Natalie’s best friend.

Taylor Sheridan scripted (the over-rated) Sicario and (genuinely thrilling) Hell or High Water. Here, as the film’s writer and director, the 47-year-old makes many nifty moves.

The abuse of Native American females needs highlighting. One shoot-out is choreographed to perfection: we feel the weight of panic as the group dynamic changes. I’ve rarely seen smiles morph into such convincing snarls (Peter Berg, who co-produced Wind River, explored the same phenomenon in his black comedy Very Bad Things). The flashback scene that follows is gruesome but not gratuitous. The vicious punches make our own ligaments flinch.

If only Cory was as vivid. In flashy, anonymous sequences, he zooms through the white wastelands on a snowmobile, looking like a wannabe James Bond. And he talks like a fortune cookie (“You’re looking for clues but missing all the signs”). Bar one speech about his dead child, he’s pretty vacant, yet the rest of the characters — including Jane, Natalie’s dad (Gil Birmingham) and the local police chief (Graham Greene) — treat him as if he were Wyoming’s answer to Buddha.

Jane, by the way, is virtually the same size and age as Cory’s dead daughter. That she not only admires but very possibly fancies Cory is a detail for Freudians to ponder.

Equally disturbing is the way Cory begins to indulge in Death Wish-style heroics. Sheridan obviously wants us to view the third act as gritty. When Cory is on screen it feels more like a wet dream: decent guy, dirty job, etc.

Renner’s a fine actor and I could watch him all day. The camera goes up close, practically giving us a guided tour of his (exceptionally large) facial pores. Hey-ho. His skin has texture, even if his character doesn’t.

Cert 15, 111 mins

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