Wild Indian

I usually dont complain a lot about endings. Good, bad, it's the writer's story and they have a reason for that. The ending here is ok and I would have accepted if we have had a bit more moments of tension, more dialogue, more development of his PTSD, more something. I felt everything undercooked. When it finished, I asked to myself: "Is that it?".

A shame because I was really liking the first two acts of the film until I realised that...it was already the end of the third one.

"Wild Indian" may have an intriguing plot on paper, but unfortunately it does not deliver. There's little self introspection, and little emotional engagement throughout. The end result is bland and boring.

The subject matter of this movie is EXTREMELY important. Unfortunately, this plays more like a fictional documentary by a dispassionate observer, moves extremely slow, lacks character development, and never provides access for the audience to feel what fundamentally motivates the characters.

In the hands of a nascent writer/director, the story was not fully and cogently developed. This is made even more dissapointing by the fact that the writer/director is the child of a psychologist -- and the essential psychological elements were repressed, undeveloped, and never explicitly expressed in the story. I can only imagine that this reflects the writer/director's own personal predicament in life -- unhealed.

Showing what happens is not nearly as engaging, emotive, and inspiring of compassion and empathy as exploring the fundamental reasons WHY it happens. Abstract causality merely conveys confusion on the part of the film maker -- perhaps reflecting his own unresolved confusion about life on the res.

How do you portray generational trauma on the screen? Watch this movie and see Michael Greyeyes do this brilliantly. Has any actor attempted to do this let alone so masterfully? Difficult storyline but beautiful and much appreciated.

I really enjoyed this film but felt the trailers I'd seen were cut to make the movie seem different than it really was. Adding stars like Kate and Jesse but giving them a few minutes of screen time wasn't necessary for this film to still be a great slow burning drama.