Duo Bujie leads Kekexili's eco-vigilantes.

Samuel Goldwyn Films, National Geographic and Columbia Film Production Asia

Most artists tend to romanticize nature, not understanding that what is stark and forbiddingly beautiful is also likely to be fatal for just those same qualities. The clean, pure desert, the deep, blue sea, the high mountains, and arid plain—they look great in pictures, but woe to the man who finds himself there alone. Not so director Lu Chuan, who unfolds this blunt, clear-eyed crime tale in the high plateau region north of Tibet's Himalayan range. Kekexili is a nature preserve some three to four miles above sea level. The region's indigenous antelope are being slaughtered by poachers, guts tossed in the dust for vultures to eat, the pelts brought to market for sweaters worn in faraway Beijing. Based on true events during the '90s, Patrol relates how Tibetan-Chinese locals form a vigilante band to stop the poaching. They have no government support, no money, limited bullets and supplies. Jeeps break down in the wilderness, or sink into salty, thawing lake beds. You can die of thirst or cold, or be sucked into quicksand. Or the poachers might just shoot you in the head with an AK-47.