Palm Springs, CA

I often judge a film by the moment when analysis falls away. As someone who can’t help dissecting story structure, camera choices, or pacing while I’m in the theater, the films that silence that voice are rare. They’re the ones that pull me in so completely that I forget I’m supposed to be studying. To Kill a Wolf, the feature debut of writer-director Kelsey Taylor, did exactly that. Hours later, I still felt it lingering, and as I write this the next day, it hasn’t let go.

Taylor, with cinematographer and co-writer Adam Lee, frames the story as a modern reimagining of Little Red Riding Hood. The setup is deceptively simple: a woodsman discovers a teenage runaway, Dani, collapsed in the Oregon wilderness. He shelters her, promises to take her to her grandmother, and together they begin a journey through the forest. But what unfolds is less a fairy tale than an excavation of trauma, trust, and survival. The wolf, it turns out, isn’t always something with teeth in the dark. Sometimes it’s what haunts us from within.

What makes this film work is how carefully it balances restraint with revelation. The chapters — “The Woodsman,” “Grandma,” “The Wolf,” “Red” — give the story a rhythm, but not a formula. Instead of spoon-feeding explanations, Taylor trusts her audience to sit in the silences, to listen to what isn’t said. Maddison Brown’s Dani is almost spectral at first, bruised and wordless, and Ivan Martin’s Woodsman is equally guarded, his every gesture weighed down by solitude. Their uneasy bond builds not through exposition, but through quiet moments — a glance, a hesitation, a meal shared in near silence.

Lee’s cinematography amplifies the mood with an atmospheric precision that reminded me why independent cinema matters. The Oregon forest becomes a character of its own: vast and claustrophobic at once, light filtering through branches like secrets half-revealed. At times the woods feel protective; at others they swallow the characters whole. The sound design mirrors this — silences stretch, winds press in, and then a single sound cracks open the tension.

Thematically, the film wrestles with fragility and responsibility. It isn’t about revenge or neat justice. It’s about coming to terms with scars you didn’t choose, and choices you can’t undo. Dani’s trauma and the Woodsman’s isolation collide in a way that forces both to confront their own survival — not just in the forest, but in life. That’s why, long after the credits rolled, the film still pulsed in me like the after-ring of a struck bell.

Is it perfect? Not entirely. The pacing lingers in places, and some viewers may wish for sharper clarity in its symbolism. But its power lies in that very ambiguity. Like the best stories, it doesn’t hand you answers; it invites you into an experience. You don’t have to be in the driver’s seat — you get to sit back, watch the scenery pass, and stop asking, “are we there yet?”

To Kill a Wolf is more than a retelling of a familiar myth. It’s a quiet, unsettling journey through the wilderness of human connection, and a reminder that sometimes the most frightening and most redemptive battles happen not in the woods, but in ourselves. For those willing to surrender to its cadence, it’s a story worth the time, worth the reflection, and worth carrying with you long after you leave the theater.

The Desert Film Society brings the Coachella Valley together to experience the best in international and independent cinema, while creating space for dialogue about the art and craft of filmmaking.

For more information on the Desert Film Society, click here: www.DesertFilmSociety.org