"Wind River" is a case of having serious intentions messed up by dodgy genre conventions. A snow-capped crime story set in and around a Native American reservation in Wyoming, a hunter hired by Fish and Game to keep the wolves away (Jeremy Renner) discovers the body of a frozen girl. As the FBI are called in, the investigation uncovers a few other things along the way.
Thematically, this could be pretty interesting - the clash of cultures between Native American and the American mainstream, the tough conditions toughening the people who live in them. But unfortunately the script gives Elizabeth Olsen as the FBI agent the uncanny ability to be repeatedly wrong, largely so we can see just how awesome Renner is, and most of the Native Americans are pushed into smaller supporting roles. And yes, Renner does softly spoken badass with a tragic backstory pretty well, but .. sheesh, the white-male-saviourness kinda drips off the screen in ways that make it very difficult to take some of the higher intentions of the film (which pop up with the closing card) particularly seriously. Warren Ellis and Nick Cave's score is particularly irritating in using whispered spoken word sections, confusing you when nobody who sounds like that appears to be on screen.
The wilderness does look very nice and the final confrontation is pretty good, but along the way this is kinda generic material shot kinda generically. Taylor Sheridan wrote one of my favourite films from last year, Hell or High Water, but this isn't really in that league.
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