This Wind
Running time: 8:00
Post-war 1940s Alberta. Kati, a prospective teacher, and a carpenter named John have just met on the outskirts of Kati’s hometown. They wander the prairie, wrapped up in their mutual attraction. Finally they settle in a quiet meadow, and as they pass a flask of whiskey back and forth they discuss whether their relationship will grow beyond the afternoon. Secrets are revealed that will steer the course of the afternoon in a direction they didn’t anticipate.
Inspired by the sights and sounds the director has experienced driving around Alberta through the years, This Wind sets a simple, lovely story about relationships against the backdrop of the province’s wide-open prairies and towering blue skies. When you can see for miles, it’s very difficult to hide from yourself and other people.
Dylan Rhys Howard was born in Wellington, New Zealand and raised in Edmonton, Alberta. After leaving the University of Alberta, where he studied sociology and film, he graduated from Vancouver Film School’s Film Production Program with honours in 2010. He returned to Edmonton in 2011 and started making films. small talk (2012) a short experimental documentary about Edmonton musician Liam Trimble, premiered at Calgary’s Sled Island Independent Music Festival. Cities and Plains (2013), a micro-budget mumblecore film about a young couple coming to a crossroads, was named the Outstanding Narrative Film Or Video of 2013 by the Film and Video Arts Society. He would receive the same award the following year thanks to This Wind (2014), about the fleeting connection between two post-war drifters which we’re proud to feature in Prairie Tales 17. His films have been described as “quiet and upfront, honest, real, rich, fertile, built on characters with depth and complexity.” Dylan continues to make character-driven films about small, intimate connections between people and how place informs self.
