Edinburgh International Film Festival 2024: Steppenwolf, by Simon Read

Kazakh filmmaker Adilkhan Yerzhanov‘s thriller Steppenwolf is an unflinching homage to classic Western and Samurai films, set in the dystopic scrublands of the Kazakh Steppe. The story concerns a woman named Tamara, (Anna Starchenko) whose son has been abducted by human traffickers, and the deeply corrupt and morally vacant cop (Berik Aitzhanov) she convinces to help track him down.

Yerzhanov has spoken about his film in terms of destiny, and as a skewed example of the hero’s journey it is worth bearing in mind that our sociopath cop seems only too aware of his own inevitable demise; there is nothing else waiting for him but death – the only question is how. From opening scenes of carnage amidst a civil war in an uncertain future, where we meet our central characters, to the ironic, gut-punch finale, the film heaps on the brutal violence, and we foresee no peaceful resolution for this ‘wolf’ cop – he is beyond saving, and that seems to suit him fine. Like so many men in such tales of the ugly underside of humanity, the only thing which will stop him is bullet to the head.

The film is striking, taking visual cues from old Westerns, while set in a sort of Mad Max-style wasteland. Tamara and her son find themselves caught in a firefight between gangsters and what is left of the police force, before the boy is snatched. Mute from trauma, Tamara barely reacts to the chaos taking place around her, but pleads for help, believing there must at least be some good left in this guy.

And so we travel the dirt roads, confronting more looters and bandits at an abandoned gas station. As Tamara and her protector push onward to the city where they believe the boy must be being held, Yerzhanov switches between carefully composed shots, silhouettes in doorways, shadows in windows and grim, post-apocalyptic vistas, to fast-cut action and uncompromising violence as things get rough.

While there is an ostensible feminist subtext to the film (the festival brochure claims it has a ‘female heart‘) it’s all pretty grim stuff, and of little substance. While he admires her stoicism is the face of bleak and terrible odds and conditions, and she tries to break through his armor, assuring him that underneath it all, “You are a kind and good person,” this feels insincere. Our nameless cop teaches Tamara self-reliance, but his completely insane attitude make her education here look more like casual misogyny dressed-up as life lessons. She smiles knowingly as he dances over the corpse of a recently dispatched gang member, as if to let us know he’s just a wild and crazy guy! We’re confronted with the question of whether he is really attempting to redeem himself, or is just out for some fun – and while the film builds to a suitably startling climax, complete with revealing twist, it’s not enough to support this kind of exploitation. Simply, there hasn’t been enough thought put into the characters and their journey.

Yerzhanov is an incredibly prolific director, having made at least one (sometimes two) feature film per year since 2011 – a stretch for any filmmaker, not least one working primarily in the Kazakhstan region and with relatively low budgets, but despite a few slick set-pieces and game performances from its leads, Steppenwolf feels like a first draft. I’ve no doubt the director has many more films lined up, but there’s something to be said for patience, not to mention subtlety. When the film dares us to care, letting a sliver of sentimentality creep into its otherwise empty, nihilistic worldview, we must reject it.

Whether it’s a bullet to the head or a punch to the gut, make it count. Make it mean something.