Desert Road (2024)

Desert-Road-(2024)
Desert Road (2024)

The manmade cities which lay past Palm Springs and Los Angeles, are located on a desert area, and the manmade cities seem to stretch as far as one can see. That is a place wherein one can leave their car while stepping away for a long time without the fear of being found. According to the area you are situated in, or if you take a turn that seems appealing, the cell coverage range could vary, and during that time there may be no other vehicle in view for hours. Even without any fantasy or sci-fi vehicles there, it is still a very remote and depressing place.

Clare (Kristine Froseth) might be cursing her fate now more than she ever might have after a car accident over a few reasons, for if the ‘community’ of rocks and hot desert is concerned even that is not. Desert Road made its world premiere in SXSW Film Festival and it narrates the story of Clare who after a car crash wakes up with a wrecked vehicle near a fence around a gas station and a factory. If the above is attempted backwards, one can think of a wasteland beyond cars which is further away from gas and petrol stations. When one gets closer to the gas station with the factory on one end and starts moving toward the other end, one gets closer to the wrecked car. For the petrol where a car is located, everything can be clearly seen from the hills nearby. She’s cut off from everything and has no intuition of what is going on.

While Rowan Triplett makes every effort to make the reader comprehend that bloodshed does not really need to be the central theme of the narrative, it is evident that it is the starting phrase that grabs the attention of the readers. Clare, a budding photographer with dreams of making it big in Hollywood, decides to take a break from her dreams and visit her mother. On her journey, she decides to stop by a gas station where Randy (Max Mattern) the clerk is a little too friendly for comfort and gets a little too close for Clare’s liking. For women, in particular, and in this situation, while driving through isolated rugged terrains and deserted locations, a subtle threat of utter violence when looked at from the right perspective is not entirely out of the ordinary. Clare does not possess anything that could stand strong in cementing her dislike for Randy’s ways and actions; yet, she does not feel at ease with him, and with good reason, if she were to get cornered by Randy and the gas station.

Desert Road is an extraordinary addition to the indie film scene, and Clare’s portrayal of Abigail demonstrates that in identical situations with sensible execution, extraordinary effects can be produced. To be reasonable, Clare has been placed in adherence of singular logic, and she is quite thoroughly aware of herself as a character and the story she reflects in the movie. She strives to achieve her goals with a clear methodology. She will rebel against affirmative provocations alright, however, every revolted person who possesses common sense can reasonably break out into tears in such outrageous circumstances, as she does which is why she shouldn’t be. Most of the work in this picture’s creation rests on this young actress’s shoulders, thus the audience is exposed to wide nuances of her performance, mostly of Abigail accompanied by rather gentle but burning love. Everyone is deeply moved and wants Clare to be set free which narrows their vision causing broad and repetitive threads of ideas and solutions in which Clare Abdiel became entangled.

The expectation that the aesthetics of the film would maneuver today’s places and help the audience balance the claustrophobic feeling that the film’s world created, was not realized. Francisco Nabia, the cinematographer, effortlessly tailored the cinematography and enhanced and ensured desert elements and its displacement throughout numerous times of the days and their different shades.

This insight rather strengthens Clare’s ambition to discover a certain photograph that qualifies among the unrivaled glory images and saves Desert Road from visual boredom which is bound to be the case since Clare in the end has to do the same movements and the same days ad nauseum.

There should not be a thought to spoil Clare’s condition for the readers, but it must also be said here that everything gets back on a leash and reverts to an ending that is entertaining, hideous, soothing, tragic as well as motivational. It’s a tonal sleight-of-hand orchestrating it all for the audience and finally, the audience takes the bait that had been laid so early on in the picture that the audience has almost forgotten about it. Sometimes “puzzle box” indie films wherein the viewer is provided a single odd supernatural event in a narrow frame can seem like a joke that one has been deemed to hear a million and one times and now is sick and tired of hearing there is humor in a punchline which does not occur. There is this humour in the line which is connected but all of them are never connected. Here, I would suggest Desert Road, Triplett manages to shape Clare’s sentimental curve in such a way so that when an explanation is made the smooth advancement of her development is climaxed. It is the kind of movie that one wants to watch over and over in about just a few minutes purely to figure out how certain things were done.

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