By Seth Lukas Hynes
Border
Starring Eva Melander and Eero Milonoff
Rated MA15+
In the tradition of sombre Scandinavian cinema, Border is a fantasy drama driven by powerful performances, intimate emotional insight and outstanding pacing.
Tina (Eva Melander), a border customs officer with a brutish appearance and the ability to smell fear, meets Vore (Eero Milonoff), a man with a similar appearance and past. The two form a relationship, through which Tina learns some strange facts about her identity.
Melander delivers a remarkable performance as Tina, conveying incredible intensity and nuance beneath such heavy prosthetics. Milonoff plays Vore with gruff charisma, and while Vore becomes a supportive figure for Tina, the film still drops subtle hints of dark motives beneath the surface.
Border has engrossing atmosphere and phenomenally tight structure. The film immerses us in Tina’s melancholic lifestyle and lifelong feelings of isolation, but her relationship with Vore develops a morbid yet empowering tone, with the pair gaining a primal satisfaction from each other. Steadily escalating into the macabre, Border repeatedly challenges our assumptions in startling but rational ways, and the film cleverly weaves together seemingly-disparate plot-threads, including a child pornography ring that builds to a disturbing revelation.
Nominated for Best Makeup and Hairstyling at this year’s Oscars, Border is a confronting, uplifting and utterly unique supernatural drama.
