The Wind Review (Film, 2019) #31DaysOfHorror
content warning: blood, gore, death by suicide, violence against animals, mental wellness, pregnancy loss, gun violence
The Wind is an experimental horror/western with a non-linear structure. Lizzy is a plains-woman living with her husband in relative isolation. She is a midwife, tasked with all the medical care for the few people daring to live out there. The story jumps back and forth in time, exploring Lizzy’s relationship with her new neighbor Emma as they both become pregnant in the harsh frontier.
Director Emma Tammi and screenwriter Teresa Sutherland craft a subtle horror film about suggestion and mood more than plot. This is a timeless exploration of Gothic tropes in a non-traditional environment. This isn’t Southern Gothic, either; it’s practically pre-Victorian Gothic in its use of environment as an adversary and ally. Even the various winds and wild animal species develop their own personalities. The wind on a harsh night is different from the wind of a bright day, the same way the wolves in the distance are clearly different from the wolves trying to enter the house.
The Wind nails one thing above all others in its exploration of Gothic tropes in a Great American context: the gun. The Gothic heroine finds a way to fight back and solve the mysteries of the new home or location. Here, Lizzy is given a shotgun and told to fire at any demons who come her way; she does. That gun, itself, becomes a character in the film. It is a merciless fighter for justice, firing indiscriminately at any threat, real or imagined, so Lizzy can continue to survive on the Plains. It is a fabulous device that builds an incredible amount of tension in the story. What’s more fundamentally American than solving all problems with a gun? Actually believing that a gun can solve any problem, even paranormal ones.
The timeline is a bit too ambiguous to really sell the story of The Wind. It’s a scary film that feels lost in itself. Non-linear horror can soar onscreen, but doing so in a Gothic framework is incredibly challenging. So much of Gothic relies on slowly finding a logical, not rational, exploration for the unknown that reordering the dramatic structure is confusing. We don’t know when the characters learn what they know as even the moments of realization and acquisition of knowledge are presented out of order.
Horror fans looking for a challenge will find it in The Wind. Gothic enthusiasts will find a new text to analyze in the context of centuries of literature, art, and film. It’s an incredibly tense and stylized film that doesn’t hold your hand or even offer you a match when your guiding light into the narrative begins to fail.
The Wind is streaming on Netflix.
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