Jonás Cuarón's Desierto has a certain abstract, conceptual power.

| Sep 28, 2017

Give "Desierto" credit for this: There has never been a more appropriate time for a tense thriller about Mexican immigrants avoiding the murderous advances of a gun-wielding American lunatic.

| Original Score: B- | Oct 15, 2016

A generic thriller that happens to be wrapped in political packaging. That packaging is sometimes more interesting than the thrills themselves.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Oct 15, 2016

Subtlety sits this one out.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Oct 14, 2016

Ugly and ham-fisted where it should be exciting and edifying, "Desierto" comes up short both as blood-soaked entertainment and as a blood-stirring polemic.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Oct 14, 2016

There's been a surprisingly wide range of works with extra weight in a deeply polarized year. Desierto is the nastiest of them all, but it's also the shallowest.

| Oct 14, 2016

It's not particularly nuanced. In fact, its lack of nuance is its most distinguishing characteristic.

| Oct 13, 2016

As drama, it's predictable, simplistic, exploitative, and otherwise wholly unredeemed.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Oct 13, 2016

Is it a cautionary tale for would-be border crossers, or an indictment of anti-immigrant rage? Doesn't matter; the gory unpleasantness overrides everything else.

| Oct 13, 2016

It's a short, sharp shock that never generates enough emotion toward anyone onscreen to make it the thriller it tries mightily to be.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 13, 2016

Cuarón's larger point - one that he pursues with every frame - is that border crossers deserve our sympathy. They have dreams, flaws and feelings.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 13, 2016

It turns into a predictable cat-and-mouse game with one standout performance by the killer's enthusiastically ride-or-die German Shepherd.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Oct 13, 2016

[An] overly simplistic but effectively tense nail-biter.

| Original Score: B- | Oct 13, 2016

Immigration remains a politically hot topic, one that cries out for nuanced, reasoned examination in a thoughtful film. "Desierto" isn't it.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Oct 13, 2016

Call it "bordersploitation." As in so many of those scratched-up B films of eras past, what matters is the cultural anxiety exploited to fulfill the movie's quota of cheap thrills.

| Original Score: B- | Oct 13, 2016

It's a nail-biter that exposes the hazards of immigration from the side of the victims, and the victims are not you and me.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 12, 2016

Sam's racist behavior may be intended to make him a menacing sign of our times, but such unbelievable mustache-twirling makes him as threatening as a C-grade Freddy Krueger knockoff.

| Oct 12, 2016

An impressive edge-of-your-seat thriller set within a fantastic outdoors environment.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 11, 2016

Cuarón co-wrote his father Alfonso's Gravity, and if the direction in Desierto is skilful more than truly inspired, he more than proves his ability to ratchet up the tension for a breathless survival drama of his own.

| Apr 12, 2016

The specificity of this locale isn't quite novel enough to succeed just on location. While engaging, this Desierto is a little dry.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Apr 12, 2016