An interesting New York Times story on the impending collapse of the Colorado River’s water delivery system – which supplies water to 7 Southwestern states – has us worried about our friends and relations living in Arizona and Southern California. (It also made us think of that incredible Joan Didion article, “Holy Water”, about the system for supplying water to Los Angeles.)

Perhaps it’s time to admit that we can’t expect to have huge, water-wasting cities and suburbs in the middle of the desert. In the spirit of admitting defeat and heading for bluer pastures, we offer these 8 Movies About Drought-Related Displacement.

The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

Drought, depression and displacement, all read on Henry Fonda’s mopey mug.

Three Faces West (1940)

Get double your displacement in this Western about a family escaping Nazi Germany for North Dakota, only to flee the Dust Bowl to Oregon.

The Rainmaker (1956)

Not to be confused with the same-named John Grisham adaptation, here Burt Lancaster brings the hope of water to a parched town and love to spinsterish Katherine Hepburn.

The Day the Earth Caught Fire (1961)

In this Cold War epic of mutual nuclear annihilation, our bombed out planet leaves its orbit and starts hurtling towards the sun.

The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976)

You think Earth has it bad? Some planets have so little water that their only hope is intergalactic drought ambassador David Bowie.

Dune (1984)

What is Dune’s mythic desert planet Arrakis if not a dystopian future vision of Southern California?

Jean de Florette (1986)

Even in the quaint French countryside, plays for scarce water leave families divided, loyalties tested and communities fractured.

Apocalypto (2007)

Though ultimately it’s the Spanish who do most of Mad Mel’s displacing, it’s implied that if they hadn’t God would have droughted the mighty Mayans off the face of the earth.