Dark Winds is the latest in a string of recent noir-esque detective series that have been released over the last few years on various platforms and streaming services. If you like your detective dramas to be dark and gritty, with a strong narrative in the vein of True Detective, Sinner or The Truth about the Harry Qubert Affair, then Dark Winds is the show for you.
Based on the series of books by Tony Hillerman, and set in America in the early 1970s, Dark Winds tells the story of tribal lawman Joe Leaphorn (Zahn McClarnon), a lieutenant of the Navajo Police Department.
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Joe’s duties are split between his role as chief investigator on the Reservation and being a member of that community he is tasked with investigating, walking a fine line between worlds that regularly collide. His deputy, Bernadette Manuelito (Jessica Matten) walks this line with him, balancing her spiritual beliefs with her duties as a police officer.
A bank heist followed by a double murder sets the scene for the series and introduces Joe to his new companion Jim Cree (Kiowa Gordon). Jim is a former resident of the reservation, now working for the FBI and serving as a bridge between the tribes and white America. Can he deliver or will he need to decide which world he belongs to?
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What follows is a solid police procedural with betrayal, political intrigue and racial divides adding to the tension and driving the characters to make difficult choices. The central themes focus on what it means to belong. Faith, identity and culture are intertwined with more mundane instances of kidnapping, shooting and the pursuit of law and justice. There is also the occasional encounter with the supernatural that leaves the viewer and characters unsure if what happened was real or simply a hallucination. There are no easy answers for anyone in Dark Winds, and by the end of the series, the line between right and wrong is even more blurred than it was at the start.
Filmed around the wonderfully picturesque Monument Valley, Dark Winds is as visually stunning as the narrative is compelling. The actors, directors and producers have gone to great lengths to accurately and sensitively portray the realities of First Nation communities in the early 1970s. This is evident from the heavy reliance on spoken Navajo within many of the scenes (including using it as a clever device for making sure conversations remain hidden from prying ears), to the inclusion of tribal rituals and the show using actors and members from existing tribal communities.
Many of the supporting cast deserve plaudits for their performances, but of particular note has to be Rainn Wilson as Devoted Dan, a used car salesman who is central to the main plot. Wilson plays him with an abandon and thrill that is fun to watch. But perhaps the most surprising element of Dark Winds is the production team of Robert Redford and George R. R. Martin. Whilst Redford is well known for westerns and action movies, Martin’s involvement is more surprising, though on this occasion there is nary a dragon in sight.
With the richness of the material available from this series it’s a little disappointing then that this physical release has only a single behind-the-scenes documentary as an extra. Whilst this includes interviews with the producers Robert Redford and George R.R. Martin, as well as the cast and crew, and lovely explanations on the choices to use indigenous actors as the cast, it brings little else to what is otherwise a fascinating mystery where the community it is based in is as much a character in its own right as any of the other actors in the show.
Dark Winds Season 1 is out now on DVD, Digital and Blu-ray from Acorn Media.
