On the brink of middle age, 40-year-old Daniel (Antonio Saboia) has been suspended from the police force after a deadly episode that occurred while he was in training. The son of a military man, Daniel feels lost and useless, running loops in the streets of Curitiba, one of Brazil’s most prosperous southern cities. In Daniel’s mind, the memories of a random conversation with Sara, his mysterious internet would-be lover, play like a mantra.
Drifting and lost, Daniel decides to travel across the country all the way to a small town in the beautiful but harsh and severely impoverished Brazilian Northeast, in search of his enigmatic obsession. When he finally reaches his destination, the mystery increases – the locals assure him that there’s no Sara in their village.
Private Desert (Deserto Particular) is 42-year-old writer/director Aly Muritiba’s fourth feature film, following a long career of filming award-winning shorts and several TV and streamer series, on channels including Brazilian HBO and Netflix. His previous works, both short and feature-length, have been selected by influential events such as Sundance, Cannes’ Critics Week, San Sebastian, and the Chicago Film Festival. A co-production of Brazil and Portugal, shot entirely on location in Brazil, literally from the south to the north of the country, Private Desert was selected for this year’s Viennale’s Giornata degli Autori.
“I have dedicated the recent years of my career in cinema to reflect on the theme of masculine affection,”, says Muritiba about Private Desert. “The masculine way of being, living and loving in contemporary Brazilian society, an essentially conservative and patriarchal society. The question I have asked myself both in the past and right now is: How do we men love? How can we express what we feel without hurting each other? How can we do that, if we are taught all the time that we must be strong, firm and cold?”
A revelatory performance from talented co-star Pedro Fasanaro answers these questions.