DESIERTO

Mexico, 2015, 88 minutes, Colour.
Gael all Garcia Bernal, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Alondra Hidalgo, Diego Catano, Marco Perez.
Directed by Jonas Cuaron.


This is more of the short story on film rather than a feature film. The title is stark, Desert, filmed in Baja California but the story of illegal migrants trying to get from Mexico into the United States.

And that is the plot. We see a group in a truck, the truck breaking down, the inability to fix the truck. What follows is a trek through the desert which takes its toll.

However, there is a redneck angry man driving through the desert, with his dog, who can be quite savage, and his rifle, looking for illegal migrants to shoot them. Which he does.

After eliminating most of the group, he pursues a man and woman, the woman hiding behind a tree, the man leading the shooter and his dog away from her, into the mountains, among the boulders, couple able to steal the truck but its crashing. There is a final fight, the shooter losing his dog when the man fires a flare into its mouth, the man leaving the shooter, not shooting him, to die of exposure in the desert. The man and the woman walk into the desert – but to what?

Gael Garcia Bernal is Moises and Jeffrey Dean Morgan is Sam, the shooter.

The film is written and directed by Jonas, Cuaron, the son of Alfonso Cuaron – and they collaborated in the screenplay of Gravity, directed by Alfonso.

1. The title, plain and simple?

2. The visuals of the desert, the long opening sequence of the sunrise? The son and the desert during the day? At night? Sunsets? The open vistas, the mountains, trees and shelter, brambles and snakes, hills and boulders? The musical score?

3. The relevance of the story, the illegal immigrants into the United States? Their hopes? Getting through the desert, crossing the border? The people smugglers? The ruthlessness? The money from the migrants or from their impoverished families?

4. The truck, through the desert, the human cargo, the truck breaking down, unable to be fixed?

5. The walk through the desert, the leader, the direction of the United States? Groups separating? The fence and getting through the border? Into what?

6. The people smugglers, their roles,? The young man and his treatment of the woman, abusing her? His brutal death with the dog?

7. Sam, driving through the desert, his dog, redneck, antagonistic towards the migrants, talking about his country, picking them off with his rifle, no remorse? Urging his dog onto them?

8. Moises becoming the central character, the bond with Adela? His story, driving, the police, deportation, his son, his wife thinking he would disappear, the toy Bear, his pledge to return – and the irony of the bear being used to bait the dog? Adela and her story, her father paying for her to go to the United States? Relations in the US?

9. The group dividing? The brutal scenes of their being picked off and dying?

10. Sam, his truck, the dog, the pursuit?

11. Moises and Adela, climbing into the mountains, the taking of Sam’s truck, driving, it overturning? The pursuit, her injury, noises hiding her behind the tree? Her fear, his promise to return?

12. The flare, his leading Sam, the continued pursuit, the dog, shooting the dog with a flare? Sam being relentless, up into the mountains, over the boulders and rocks, Moises and his shrewdness? The eventual confrontation, the fight, going over the cliff, Sam breaking his leg? Moises not shooting him, leaving him to die?

13. Moises recovering Adela – and their walking off? Into the desert? Any future?