Private Desert

Without many words but in a very beautiful way in the first act Aly Murityba introduces us to Daniel ( Antônio Saboia ) a military policeman from Curitiba in the cold city of the South, day with cold color palettes as well as the life of Daniel who, suspended from the police, takes care of his father who suffers something like Alzheimer's, and has a very strong virtual passion with Sarah .

During every presentation of the names of director actors studio etc between the first act and the second, we have Daniel's trip , we left Curitiba for a small town in the northeastern interior where Sarah ( Pedro Fasanaro ) supposedly resides, in a warm place as well as her passion , changes if the color palette ( that proves great photography ) Daniel places posters to find Sarah who for some reason no longer responds to messages from Daniel.

We see that Sarah also has difficulties living with her grandmother, evangelical and sees her sexual option as a disease, just as his father left him for the same reason besides working during the day in manual service.

Great performances, great track that puts ambient local music and a classic total eclipse of the hearth by Bonnie Tyler in the meetings that are very touching , great direction and editing with cuts suddenly during Daniel's long journey.

A complete film, in the right measure that deals with the search for personality of a boy from the northeastern interior, who seeks who he is but in fact we also see that the man, strong, male and of traditional military family also ends up "meeting" at the end of the film , in a sensationally acted scene, we see all that answer without having to write a word. Sensational.

Daniel, a police agent on suspension from work for assaulting a colleague, has fallen in love through an app with someone who lives thousands of miles away from him, bang in the middle of nowhere in Brazil.

After his text messages and phone calls unexpectedly go answered, he opts to hit the road and drive some 2,700 kilometres northwards from Curitiba, where he tirelessly looks after his senile old father, to Sobradinho where his new platonic love lives.

When Daniel finally makes it to his destination, he is in for a big surprise that he wasn't in the least bargaining for when he embarked on this make-or-break trip into the platonic unknown.

It is a two-hour film, every second of which I really with easily charismatic Daniel, and much more so because I did not know what this film was about, and to my pleasant surprise it didn't put me to sleep despite the beginning being a bit slow. You soon begin to take pity on Daniel because he is fully devoted to the care of his mentally disabled dad while he awaits trial for his misconduct at his workplace. To make his existence more miserable than it already is, the girl he has met online and imbues him with the energy to soldier on is no longer replying to his text messages or taking his phone calls, all of which makes you feel sympathy for good-hearted Daniel.

If you don't have a good command of the language, I recommend you watch Brazilian films in Portuguese with the aid of subtitles in a language that you speak. The beauty of these foreign films resides in the language that they are made in, and Portuguese is one of those languages that is quite pleasing to the ear, and much more so when you you are able to understand it and speak it. I really liked the dialogues that Daniel had with his lover towards the end of the film, especially the way his lover uttered words in a northern Brazilian accent.

I would have expected the end to be slightly different chiefly because the culmination and display of their pent-up emotions only lasted a mere 3 to 4 minutes. I wanted a bit more which would have been like the icing on the sweet and sour cake that the director throws at the viewer right at the end.

"However, Daniel's turnabout feels sketchy and is insufficiently spelt out, Muritiba applies a tacky sex scene to vicariously bear out Robson's irreplaceability to Daniel, which overrides the blinkered male/female distinction, then, just when Robson feels dismally dejected, he can be lifted up to finally embark on a new journey from the dead-end status quo, and it is a relief that the pair's happy ending is not staying together but both find new courage and purpose from each other, to brave their kismet paved with impediments ahead, they might be reunited in the future, but at that particular moment, Muritiba is markedly astute to leave the story as where it is, a compelling, edifying story about sexual fluidity that hits like a bang to navel-gazers, but serves as a delectable dish to the queer cinema."

read my full review on my blog: Cinema Omnivore, thanks.

The two main characters in this film give strong, nuanced performances.

This is a slow moving film. It grows on you and one needs to pay attention.

What I enjoyed in particular was that I never knew quite what was going to happen next. Each section of the film took one on a path that was slightly different from what had occurred before. One feels the turmoil inside each character.

The plot could easily have led to histrionics - even a bloodbath or a fistfight - but it doesn't. The ending just shows the slow path that each character is taking to find their fulfillment in life.

Suffice it to say that this is an LGBTQ film - but that is not all what it is about.

"Private Desert" tells the story of an off-duty police officer under internal investigation about a case of bad behavior. His life is a complete mess, jobless, looking after a retired and sick father, plus he's in a cultural shock with his young sister. His only escape is online dating with a mysterious girl. Feeling completely under pressure from the development of his case, he decides to travel across the country to find the girl who he considers to be the only real tangible thing in his current life. In his search, he finds that life is made of many shapes and colors.

This film is about searching, discovering what we are, where we came from. No matter your race, your sex, your age, the color of your eyes or hair, we have to find ourselves within ourselves. We don't know what we really are until we face our reality. Also, that love is a feeling and not an object.

Beautiful and amazing performance by Antonio Saboia as Daniel and Pedro Fasanaro as Robson. Mr. Fasanaro shines and his innocent and angelical looks is the perfect balance to the harshness of Mr. Saboia (the police officer). It also reflects the contrast of northeastern and southern of Brazil.

There are some issues with the screenplay and continuity but overall Aly Muritiba was able to deliver a very human film.