There is something deeply hypnotic about the story told in the film The son of the desertreleased in cinemas yesterday: a child who disappears at just two years old during a sandstorm and resurfaces ten years later, having survived thanks to a herd of ostriches.
It is not a fairy tale, but a story that has its roots in reality, passed down over time and now brought to the cinema by director Gilles de Maistre. The protagonist, Hadara, grows up far from humans, learning to live according to the laws of the most extreme nature. A story that recalls mythical figures like Mowgli, but with an even more surprising force: it really happened.
The film: between story and narrative frame
In the film, the story takes shape through the eyes of Sun, a little girl who has always considered the “ostrich child” a simple legend told by her grandfather. Only when he arrives in the heart of the Sahara does he discover that behind those words lies an extraordinary truth.
De Maistre thus constructs a double narrative: on the one hand the contemporary journey of the young protagonist, on the other the wild life of Hadara, played by young actors including Nahel Tran. The result is a story that alternates realism and an almost mythical dimension, trying to make a complex story accessible even to a familiar audience.
The charm (and challenge) of the man-nature relationship
The director, already known for films such as Mia and the White Lion And The wolf and the lionreturns to explore one of his most cherished themes: the bond between humans and animals. This time, however, the challenge is even more radical. It’s not just about coexistence, but about total survival. Hadara does not observe nature: he becomes part of it. He lives with animals, moves like them, communicates without words.
The filming, carried out in Morocco, took advantage of extremely rare environmental conditions, with sudden rains that transformed the desert into an almost surreal landscape, made up of temporary lakes and unrepeatable scenarios. An element that adds a powerful and authentic visual dimension to the film.
Real animals, but never forced
One of the most surprising aspects of the production is the choice to work without special effects for the animals. The ostriches featured in the film are real, and interact directly with children. To achieve this result, the crew took the opposite approach to traditional cinema: not to force the animals, but to adapt to their times. The little actors spent long periods in contact with the ostriches, learning to know them and establishing an authentic relationship. The result is a staging that focuses entirely on emotional credibility, avoiding artificial spectacularizations.
A cinema designed for families
Behind the project there is also a precise vision: to create a cinema that can be shared between generations. De Maistre works closely with his family, involving his children in reading the scripts and even in the casting. The goal is to build stories capable of speaking to children, parents and grandparents at the same time, offering different but complementary reading levels. Not just entertainment, but also a space to reflect on themes such as nature, growth and the relationship with the environment.
Criticism: a missed opportunity?
Despite its ambitions, the film also raised several concerns. Some observers have highlighted a narrative weighed down by an overly constructed structure, which risks diluting the strength of the main story. The choice to insert a narrative frame, although interesting on paper, ends up taking away space from the most intense moments linked to Hadara’s life.
Even the visual style, judged by some to be excessively “clean”, would attenuate the harshness and ambiguity of the desert, transforming it into a less engaging backdrop. The risk, according to these readings, is that of a story that fails to fully convey the emotional power of the real story.
Between dream and reality
Yet, despite the criticisms, The son of the desert it remains a project that is striking for its ambition. Telling such an extreme story means dealing with the very limits of cinematic language. Hadara is not just a character, but a symbol: he represents a lost connection with nature, a way of life that modern humanity has almost forgotten. And this is perhaps the most powerful point of the film: reminding us that, even in today’s hyper-connected world, there are stories capable of bringing us back to the essentials.
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