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The desert odyssey of Galician director Oliveras Laše “Sirāts” is one of the most radical European films of last year, a trance-like cinematic experience that masterfully interweaves the themes of family and the end of the world. A conversation with director Oliver Laxe and lead actor Sergi López at the European Film Academy in Berlin.

Can cinema become a ritual experience and lead the viewer to catharsis? A conversation about this with two brilliant European artists whose voices have not been heard much in these latitudes. Two personalities who did not ask for comments in their homes before, but with the film “Sirāts” have become known to lovers of bold cinema in many parts of the world.

Cinema reviewers tend to call it one of the most radical films of last year. About the catharsis ceremony. About the dance of death in the desert. The film “Sirāts” by Galician director Oliveras Laše does not leave anyone indifferent, but it is not easy to watch – or rather to feel – it. It pierces the viewer not only with sharp plot twists, but above all with pulsating techno rhythms and breathtaking views of the Moroccan desert.

The film “Sirāt” won the Jury Prize of the Cannes Film Festival last year and is now in the running for two Oscars – for the best foreign film and the best sound. “Sirāt” also received a number of awards at the European Film Academy ceremony in January of this year, although in the main categories it was conceded, in the words of film critic Dita Rietumas, to “tasteful moderation” – the Norwegian film “Sentimental Value”.

But “Sirāts” continues to make people talk about themselves and from February 20, the film will be available in cinemas in Latvia.

Fame has followed director Oliver Lash since his first feature film “You are all captains”, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2010 and received the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) award. Lashe has also returned to Cannes with his next films and has never gone home empty-handed. His fourth film “Sirāt” won the Jury Prize of the Cannes Film Festival.

Oliver Lachet was born in France, but his parents are from Galicia. The director has also returned to live in Galicia in the north-west of Spain, and in our conversation he also emphasizes that the Galician heritage is very important to him. We meet in a small circle of journalists shortly before the European Film Academy Awards in Berlin.

Lashe is an unusual person with a strong visual image: he is two meters tall (he once trained seriously in basketball), with long, dark hair flowing down his back and the eyes of a photo model. He studies gestalt therapy, is a mystic and charismatically pulls those around him into his world of thoughts. When Lašem is asked about cooperation with DJs in the making of the film “Sirāt”, the 43-year-old director relaxes calmly in his chair, and there is a feeling that something from the rave atmosphere enters the interview room.

“First of all, you should understand that I danced the film footage first. I myself went to raves in the desert. By the way, I myself lived in Morocco for five years. And the script of the film gradually took shape in my head while I was dancing,” Oliver Lasche begins the conversation. “Also, the actual process of writing a script is very atmospheric. And music is atmospheric. I think my sensibility as an artist is very much related to sound, to this layered structure of image and sound. My scripts always have links to music. I didn’t want to work with a composer for this film, but with an active musician. I auditioned and Kangding Ray turned out to be the best. I needed someone who could create a dialogue with this cathartic techno music that is closely related to folk music, but which at the same time could also create more ethereal, ambient music.”

Film critic Dārta Ceriņa also named “Sirātu” as her film of the year, when she summarized last year’s film crop in our program “Kur kritiħim nava vete” (Where there is no room for critics).