Wyoming Story

Rating: 8/10 (5 October 2017)

Taylor Sheridan is an actor turned writer-director who last year put out the vastly overlooked Hell or High Water. It was my favorite film of 2016. The script deserved best picture and best screenplay at the Oscars. Wind River is not quite as good, but it is still an excellent movie. Jeremy Renner plays a wildlife agent whose main job is to keep coyotes from decimating herds of sheep. While on the prowl in search of a marauding mountain lion, he comes upon a dead eighteen year-old girl from the town. She is face down in the snow with blood coming out of her mouth. The FBI is summoned to the Wind River Indian Reservation to help the understaffed local police solve the crime. Elizabeth Olsen is the agent and she joins Renner in the search for the killer. Along the way, they encounter drug addicts and other colorful but depressing people. Renner's ex-wife is Indian and they have a boy together. It turns out that their high school aged daughter had a bad experience with a criminal element and this pretty much rounds out the story. The scenery of Wyoming and Utah are spectacular and the script is precise with some good, witty moments. So far for 2017, Get Out and Wind River are two best films.