The landscape of a dystopian future that Mad Max predicted exists today, and it is found in Mauritania.
The landscape of a dystopian future that Mad Max predicted exists today, and it is found in Mauritania. There, Salka decides to migrate to Europe for a better future. Disguised as a boy, she will have to cross the entire Sahara Desert on the world's longest train journey to reach the Atlantic coast. The lonely journey through the vast desert and the tireless metallic sound of the train tracks turn this trip into a dreamlike and hypnotic odyssey.
Salka lives in one of the poorest countries in the world. Mauritania is isolated from the world, with great social imbalances, for the great majority of its population it is a barren and hopeless land where mafias and smuggling reign freely and make inequalities and lack of opportunities even more evident, especially for women. Director Xavi Herrero, who has become the first westerner to make the return journey of the SNIM train, known as the desert train, becomes a silent witness to Salka’s 1,400km journey. Its route, under temperatures that can reach up to 50 ° C, is not without dangers; it surrounds the so-called "no man’s land", a conflicting border zone between Mauritania and Western Sahara, where Moroccan army incursions are constant.
