Sahara is a 2005 action/adventure film, directed by Breck Eisner, loosely based on the best-selling book of the same name by Clive Cussler.

Critics gave the film average reviews but audiences gave it higher marks. Opening at #1, it grossed $18 million on its first weekend. Earning almost $69 million in the USA in its theatrical run and over $119 million worldwide with a budget of $130 million. The movie has done very well with rentals and DVD sales and has far exceeded its budget costs.

Awards: IFTA - Best Cinematography (2005) (Seamus McGarvey)

To promote the film, actor Matthew McConaughey drove his own personal Air Stream trailer (painted with a large Sahara movie poster on each side) across America, stopping at military bases and many events , such as the Daytona 500 (to Grand Marshal the race), premiering the movie to fans, signing autographs, and doing interviews at each stop. The trip's highlights were shown on an E! channel special to coincide with the film's release. McConaughey also kept a running blog of his trip on MTV's entertainment website. Both MTV and the film's distributor, Paramount Pictures, are owned by Viacom.

In February 2005, Cussler took legal action against Philip Anschutz, the producer, for failing to consult him on the script.

Master explorer Dirk Pitt (played by Matthew McConaughey) travels to Mali, to search for what the locals call "The Ship of Death", the lost Civil War ironclad warship CSS Texas that has a mysterious cargo. Pitt and his sidekick Al Giordino (played by Steve Zahn) manage to thwart the assassination of Doctor Eva Rojas (played by Penélope Cruz), a scientist who is investigating the source of a disease that is wreaking havoc in the area. The cause is a vast amount of pollution that is threatening to cause an environmental disaster. It is up to Pitt and his associates at the National Underwater and Marine Agency (NUMA) to locate the source of the pollution and shut it down, and explore the connection between the deaths and the missing ironclad.

Tagline: Dirk Pitt. Adventure has a new name.

When Dirk Pitt is explaining the history of the five Confederate gold dollars, he says that Jefferson Davis had them made in 1865 and gave four of them to his top generals: Lee, Stonewall Jackson, JEB Stuart, and Johnson. Stonewall Jackson had died in 1863 and Stuart in 1864, so it would have been impossible to give gold coins to them.