Beyond Fest, BFI London Film Festival, Bruno Nunez Arjona, Cannes Film Festival, drama, Fantastic Fest, film festivals, Jade Oukid, Joshua Liam Henderson, Morocco, movies, New York Film Festival, Oliver Laxe, reviews, Richard Bellamy, Sergi Lopez, Sirat, Stefania Gadda, Tonin Janvier
October 23, 2025
by Carla Hay
Directed by Óliver Laxe
Spanish and French with subtitles
Culture Representation: Taking place in Morocco, the dramatic film “Sirāt” features a predominantly white and Middle Eastern cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.
Culture Clash: A middle-aged man and his pre-teen son search for the man’s missing adult daughter at illegal rave parties, and these distraught family members get more than they bargained for when they start hanging out with a group of partiers.
Culture Audience: “Sirāt” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in atmospheric dramas that go on unexpected harrowing journeys.
“Sirāt” is a disturbing and entrancing drama that becomes more than a story about the search for a missing woman in the Moroccan desert. The psychedelic partier lifestyle is on display, but the movie doesn’t stray too far from sobering realities. At a certain part of the movie, “Sirāt” is not easy to watch. However, the movie succeeds in its intention of being an unsettling depiction of how lives can drastically change within a few seconds.
Directed by Óliver Laxe (who co-wrote the “Sirāt” screenplay with Santiago Fillol), “Sirāt” had its world premiere at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Jury Prize (the equivalent of second place), the Cannes Soundtrack Award, and the Palm Dog Grand Jury Prize for canine actors. The movie made the rounds at several other film festivals in 2025, including the Toronto International Film Festival, Beyond Fest, Fantastic Fest, the New York Film Festival and the BFI London Film Festival. “Sirāt” is the official selection for Spain’s entry for Best International Feature Film for the 2026 Academy Awards. The movie takes place in an unnamed desert area in Morocco, where “Sirāt” was filmed on location.
“Sirāt” (which means “path” in Arabic) begins by showing a massive sound system being set up outside in a desert for an illegal rave party. The party is then shown in full swing, with people dancing to the electronic music being played on the speakers, Most of the people at this rave are in the 20s and 30s, but some middle-aged people are at the party too.
Amidst this carefree atmosphere are a worried Spanish father and son, who are looking for a missing loved one. Luis (played by Sergi López) and his son Esteban (played by Bruno Núñez Arjona), who’s about 11 or 12 years old, are searching for Esteban’s young adult sister Mar, who was last known to be an attendee of these types of raves in Morocco. Luis, who is Mar’s father, hasn’t heard from Mar in the past five months. The mother of Mar and Esteban is not mentioned in the movie, which implies that Luis is a bachelor father.
Luis and Esteban hand out missing-person flyers with Mar’s photo on it and ask people if they’ve seen her. Most of the people they ask say they’ve never seen Mar. But there’s a possible clue when someone in a group of ravers says that Mar looks familiar, and she could be at the next rave that they plan to go to deeper in the desert.
The group of ravers who might know Mar are a motley crew of five people in their 20s to 40s. They all appear to be drifters who indulge in taking psychedelic drugs on a frequent basis. (LSD is mentioned multiple times in the movie.) Very little is told about their personal backgrounds because they seem to want to escape from their pasts and avoid having “normal” lives.
However, these five ravers have formed a close-enough bond that they travel together. They have two vans for their travels. The five ravers also have a female terrier dog with them named Lupita.
“Sirāt” has non-professional actors in the roles of the ravers. These are the five ravers who are featured prominently in the movie:
- Jade (played by Jade Oukid), who appears to be in her mid-to-late 20s, is rebellious and seems to be the one who is most likely to know who Mar is.
- Stef (played by Stefania Gadda), who is an “earth mother” type, seems to be in her 40s but looks older due to her leathery skin.
- Tonin (played by Tonin Janvier), who is in his late 30s or early 40s, has a metal chair leg for his missing left leg, indicating that he can’t afford to get a prosthetic leg.
- Bigui (played by Richard Bellamy), who is in his mid-to-late 40s, also has a missing body part: He doesn’t have a right hand. He has a stump where his right hand would be.
- Josh (played by Joshua Liam Henderson), who is in his 30s, is fluent in multiple languages, including Spanish, English and French. Out of all of these ravers, Josh seems the most well-traveled and the best-educated, which hints that he comes from an affluent background.
No explanation is given for why Tonin and Bigui have missing body parts. However, things happen later in the movie that could lead viewers to speculate a plausible reason why Bigui and Tonin have missing limbs. Tonin and Bigui don’t talk about their disabilities and don’t let their missing limbs prevent them from doing what they want to do.
Not long after Luis and Esteban find out that Mar could be at an upcoming rave party, the current rave party is broken up with the arrival of a military convoy of soldiers, who put a stop to the party and order all the non-Europeans to be taken into custody. The military vehicles have surrounded the partygoer vehicles on all sides while the partygoer vehicles are lined up and ordered to follow the military convoy.
Jade, Stef, Tonin, Bigui and Josh have other ideas. They spontaneously decide to drive away from the line of cars and take a detour into the desert. Esteban urges Luis, who is driving their van, to follow these runaway ravers. Some of the soldiers give chase, but the runaway vehicles are able to escape.
The first half of “Sirāt” is mostly about Luis and Estaban following the ravers further into the desert and getting to know the ravers better. Luis and Esteban have a female terrier dog with them too. Her name is Pipa, who is mostly looked after by Esteban.
At one point in the story, Pipa gets temporarily sick because it’s suspected that she unknowingly ingested the LSD-laced feces of one of the ravers who defecated in the desert. No one admits to causing this problem, but the ravers think it was probably Tonin or Bigui. Although no animals were actually harmed in the making of “Sirāt,” people who love pets will feel uncomfortable watching this part of the movie.
Not much more can be said about what happens in “Sirāt” without giving away too much information. It’s enough to say that in the second half of the movie, problems occur that go way beyond the search for Mar. The movie’s performances are very realistic, with López giving a standout portrayal of a grieving father. The other cast members do sufficiently well in their roles, especially the non-professional actors.
In addition to having a riveting screenplay, “Sirāt” excels with immersive cinematography (by Mauro Herce) and haunting music score (by Kangding Ray) and how these technical elements creatively show the dichotomies of being in this desert location. The desert can be an escapist refuge (as shown in the rave scenes) or an isolating trap (as shown in later scenes). The movie’s use of throbbing electronic music starts out as an expression of joy and then becomes increasingly filled with dread. The biggest flaw in the 114-minute “Sirāt” is that it takes a little too long to tell the story that the movie ends up telling. However, “Sirāt” is a memorable story that cuts deep in showing the cruel nature of human tragedy.
Neon will release “Sirāt” in select U.S. cinemas on November 14, 2025, with an expansion to more U.S. cinemas in January 2026. The movie was released in Spain on June 6, 2025, and in France on September 10, 2025.