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Opinion

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This article was published 17/08/2017 (2436 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

American movies are filled with tough guys.

Few of those movies bother to scratch the surface in exploring how those guys got so tough.

In his past screenplays, Sicario and Hell or High Water, Wind River writer-director Taylor Sheridan has suggested male toughness is a hard-won byproduct of tragedy. In the case of Sicario’s titular badass, played by Benicio Del Toro, the extreme nature of his personal tragedy has irrevocably twisted him.

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That is not the case with Wyoming game tracker Cory Lambert, played by Jeremy Renner. In the film’s opening minutes, we see he is a hard-bitten man, calmly dispatching a wolf about to prey on a flock of sheep. On a subsequent hunt for a cougar, Lambert stumbles upon the dead body of a young woman, barefoot and evidently running from something when she collapsed and succumbed to the elements.

The death strikes a sad, familiar chord with Lambert: the girl, Natalie (Kelsey Asbille), was the best friend of his own daughter, also deceased. When city-based FBI agent Jane Banner (Elizabeth Olsen) arrives on the scene to investigate an apparent murder, we have a feeling Lambert’s offer to assist the investigation is driven by personal motive.

In any case, he proves to be a crucial ally, especially, as Banner soon learns, cops can’t expect much in the way of backup on the Wind River Indian Reservation. “This is the land of ‘You’re on your own,’” explains wily reservation sheriff Ben (Graham Greene).

An investigation proceeds, with the inquiry leading from the girl’s shattered father (Gil Birmingham, House of Cards) to her brother (Martin Sensmeier), living a bleak, druggie existence on the periphery of the reserve. (Lambert proves to be an unusual kind of hero, in that he can employ either violence or tenderness as the situation requires.)

When the hunt is focused on Natalie’s suspiciously missing boyfriend, the value of civilized, 21st-century law enforcement methods fall away. This is a place where it pays to be good with a gun.

Wind River has been criticized in some quarters as a white-knight-on-the-rez story: Lambert’s ex-wife (Julia Jones) is Indigenous but he is ultimately a white guy coming to the rescue.

There is some validity to this. But there is also some justification in Sheridan’s rationale for writing the script the way he did. Sheridan is also a white guy with some personal experience of reservation life, and he was more comfortable writing the hero from a perspective closer to his own.

Ultimately, the important test is the overall strength of the movie. It passes on that count. Wind River is a gripping piece of work, building on themes addressed in Sicario and Hell or High Water of a 19th-century frontier ethos surviving into the 21st century.

As a first-time director, Sheridan may not have the ability to induce dread with the skill of Sicario director Denis Villeneuve. Yet he does have an undeniable talent. He raises the stakes of the film’s action beats by painstakingly establishing emotional connection to these characters.

That would certainly appeal to the film’s main stars, Renner and Olsen, who both contribute solid, mature work. But it also applies to the supporting cast, including Canadian actors Graham Greene and Tantoo Cardinal (who has just one brief but lovely scene outfitting Olsen’s underdressed fed). Especially notable is Birmingham as the murder victim’s father. His work with Renner is poignant, heartbreaking and, in the final scene, delicately funny.

The actor is 64. Is that too late to be considered a breakout star?

randall.king@freepress.mb.caTwitter: @FreepKing