In this documentary film, director Patricio Guzmán showcases Chile's snow-capped mountain spine. Through interviews with a writer, an artist, a cameraman, and a volcanologist, the film presents the ways the mountains have shielded Chile from outside forces, and how it has forced its citizens to be trapped in their own land, making them stagnant and inward. The Cordillera of Dreams is the third installment of a trilogy that started with Nostalgia for the Light and continued with The Pearl Button.