Desierto is a 2015 Mexican thriller co-written and directed by Jonás Cuarón who previously shared the Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film at the 2014 BAFTAs for his contribution as a writer on Academy Award-winning Gravity.
It screened at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival where it won the International Federation of Film Critics award under the Special Presentations category. Mexico has officially announced Desierto as their submission for the category of Best Foreign Language Film at the 89th Academy Awards.
In Desierto, what begins as a hopeful journey to seek a better life becomes a harrowing and primal fight for survival. Following the sudden breakdown of their truck, Moises leads 13 immigrants on a journey through the harsh desert terrain. The tranquil desert landscape is soon broken by the sounds of gunfire when a deranged, rifle-toting vigilante and his hunting dog chases the group of unarmed men and women through the treacherous U.S.-Mexican border. In the harsh, unforgiving desert terrain, the odds are stacked firmly against them as they continuously discover there’s nowhere to hide from the unrelenting, merciless killer.
Desierto stars Gael García Bernal, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Alondra Hidalgo and will be releasing at selected cinemas across South Africa on the 11th of November 2016.
