Taking cues from William Friedkin and George Miller, and wearing these influences proudly on his sleeves, Oliver Laxe delivers one of the most fascinating desert-set films in recent memory — a heart-achingly beautiful journey towards the end of ends. Kicking off with a search for a missing daughter/sister, Sirāt (2025, 115′)—named after a bridge that links heaven and hell, „its passage narrower than a hair, sharper than a sword“—transforms into a road movie that sees the birth of a surrogate family, until a harrowing tragedy turns it into a Grim Reaper’s playground refusing to be defined. At once poignantly intimate and broadly foreboding, it strongly resonates with our times, its apocalyptic vibes shaking you to the core, as its unapologetic bleakness burrows deep into your mind/soul. Confidently directed, with always reliable Sergi López, as a worried father, integrating a group of non-professional ravers who play meta-versions of themselves, the feature plunges you into its inhospitable setting by way of Kangding Ray’s pounding electronica, and Mauro Herce’s handsome lensing of scorching vistas and sunburnt, self-ostracized characters.

Film still: Festival autorskog filma/Auteur Film Festival Promo.