Desierto

An arid, sun-seared stretch of the US-Mexico border turns into a killing field for a truckload of illegal immigrants in this chase thriller from Jonas Cuarón (son of Gravity director Alfonso). Inadvertently stranded in the wilderness, Moises (Gael García Bernal) and his fellow Mexicans soon find themselves in the crosshairs of Jeffrey Dean Morgan's merciless redneck, who scoffs "Welcome to the Land of the Free" as his high-powered rifle and deadly dog (imaginatively called Tracker) brutally cull the group. Morgan is an indefatigable foe but etched so one-dimensionally that the film's subsequent lapse into an existential head-to-head battle for survival with García Bernal undercuts the tension. The Baja desert location at least provides a suitably harsh landscape for the relentless pursuit to play out, but the supporting characters are left high and dry by the thinly drawn protagonists.