Director: Óliver Laxe

Stars: Sergi López, Bruno Núñez Arjona, Jade Oukid, Stefania Gadda, Joshua Liam Henderson

Spanish director Laxe’s extraordinary picture is pitched somewhere between audacious hallucinatory odyssey and dark punishing cinematic DJ set. The title refers to the Islamic notion that there is a fragile bridge over Hell that the dead must cross to make their way to paradise. López is Luis, a middle-aged father, who, accompanied by his young son Esteban, (Arjona) is scouring the Moroccan desert in search of the missing daughter he believes may have taken up with an alternative community. Father and son make their way to a rave where they hand out her picture to the revellers. Kindly tattooed raver Jade (Oukid) tells Luis that although she does not recognize the daughter, there is another rave due to take place at a secret venue further into the desert. Luis and Estaban follow Jade’s group, who are travelling in their own heavy-duty military trucks, in their worryingly inadequate minivan. Initially the group try and shake Luis but are won over by his reckless determination. During their journey, alongside the bonding, there is talk and reports of war and apocalyptic events.Soundtracked to an insistent electronic pulse by composer Kanding Ray, Laxe’s picture marries cinematographer Maruo Herce’s extraordinary desert imagery to a plot which, while elusive, possesses a rare allegorical power, leaving audiences to draw their own connections. Some very harrowing sequences are tempered with moments of kindness and connection, but the final act is a nerve-wracking bad trip.

David Willoughby

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