For his third feature, Zhang set "Desert Dream" (2007) in a small, drought-threatened village on the Chinese-Mongolian border where the lives of a farmer obsessed with tree planting to stave off desertification, a woman North Korean defector and her child, and a wandering soldier cross paths (the film's original title "Hyazgar" means "boundary" in Mongolian). Co-produced by Korea, Mongolia and France, it was invited to compete at the 57th Berlin International Film Festival. "Desert Dream" won Best Picture at the 9th Osian's Cinefan Festival of Asian and Arab Cinema in New Delhi, and Zhang was nominated for Best Director at the 2nd Asian Film Awards.