Review: Border

Image courtesy of Neon.

Deformed babies. Maggot eating. A pedophile ring. Troll sex (no, seriously). Suffice it to say that Ali Abbasi's peculiar and committed "Border" has something for everyone. The picture made a splash at the Cannes Film Festival this year, and critics appeared to take some delight in its outlandishness. But while its leading lady, Eva Melander (under seemingly pounds of makeup), gives a sterling performance and the movie wears its outrageousness as a badge of honor, the film never quite grabbed me the way it did others.

Still, there's a fair amount to praise in this oddly original fairy tale, starting with Melander, who gives an almost feral performance as Tina, a border security patrolwoman whose heightened senses - namely, her sense of smell - enables her to sniff out ne'er-do-wells attempting to sneak contraband items, from drugs to child pornography, across the border.

Aside from this odd ability to sniff out crime, we get the sense that there's something a little off about Tina from the large scar running up her back to her heavy brows, snaggleteeth and puffy face. One day, she meets a man named Vore (Eero Milonoff) bearing similarly distorted features, only he wears his proudly as opposed to a mask to hide behind as Tina tends to do. At first, Tina appears to be suspicious of Vore, and a full-body search leads to some shocking discoveries.

But her curiosity surrounding this man with a similarly misshapen face leads Tina to begin snooping around and, eventually, spending time with Vore. This all leads to one of the stranger sex scenes in recent memory as well as a subplot in which Tina works with law enforcement officials to root out a child porn ring.

While Melander's performance carries the day here, one of my issues with the movie is how the filmmakers sensationalize the characters' deformities. Not only that, but it equates their outward appearances with freakish behavior - Vore feeding maggots to Tina, for instance, or... well, don't get me started on what Vore keeps in his refrigerator.

There is, on the other hand, something to be said for the film's insistence that its two leads' outlandish behavior is no worse than its, for lack of a better phrase, normal humans - and I italicize that word for a reason you'll understand once you see the film. There's Tina's creep of a roommate who not only takes advantage of her kindness, but also attempts to force himself on her when he's drunk. Then, of course, there are the horrific people involved in the child sex tape ring that Tina helps to investigate. So, in this sense, the film nearly redeems its obsession with Tina and Vore's appearances through its concept that seemingly outward normalcy doesn't necessarily equal good intentions.

"Border" is a unique picture with a solid lead performance that injects some life into a film that seemingly traffics in drab scenery - with the exception of Tina and Vore's visits to the woods - on purpose. It is occasionally squirm inducing, but also suspenseful. In terms of a genre film - it's a strange romance-horror hybrid - it scores points for originality, even if it didn't always work for me.