Movie · 2018 · Fantasy, Drama, Crime · 1h 50m · R · SV
Curator score: 5.9/10 (104.6K ratings)
Sense something beautiful
Overview
When a border guard with a sixth sense for identifying smugglers encounters the first person she cannot prove is guilty, she is forced to confront terrifying revelations about herself and humankind.
Ratings
Curator score: 5.9/10
IMDb: 7.0/10
Letterboxd: 3.56/5
Rotten Tomatoes: 97%
Metacritic: 75
TMDB: 6.7/10
Director
Ali Abbasi
Production
Meta Film Stockholm, Black Spark Film & TV, Film i Väst, SVT, Meta Film, Copenhagen Film Fund
Cast
Eva Melander, Eero Milonoff, Jörgen Thorsson, Ann Petrén, Sten Ljunggren, Kjell Wilhelmsen, Rakel Wärmländer, Andreas Kundler, Matti Boustedt, Tomas Åhnstrand, Josefin Neldén, Henrik Johansson, Ibrahim Faal, Åsa Janson, Donald Högberg, Krister Kern, Viktor Åkerblom, Robert Enckell, Elisabeth Göransson, Aksel Dis
Curator Review
Verdict
A daring, singular blend of Nordic folklore, body horror, and melancholy romance, Border is one of those films that feels both deeply strange and emotionally sincere. Its mystery-thriller framework is less important than the way it turns difference, shame, and desire into something raw and humane.
Best for
Viewers who like unsettling art-house genre hybrids
Fans of folklore-inflected fantasy and body horror
People open to taboo, provocative romance
Audiences who appreciate strong atmosphere and transformative makeup effects
Skip if
You want a conventional crime thriller
You’re uncomfortable with explicit sexual content and bodily grotesquerie
You prefer clear-cut mythology over ambiguity
You dislike films that are deliberately bizarre or emotionally abrasive
Overview
Border is the rare genre film that commits fully to its own strangeness without losing emotional clarity. What begins as a procedural about a border guard with uncanny instincts slowly opens into a mythic story about identity, instinct, and belonging, with Ali Abbasi keeping the tone grounded even as the film gets increasingly uncanny.
Worth noting
The film’s power comes from its refusal to treat the grotesque as a joke or a gimmick. Eva Melander’s performance is astonishing, and the makeup and physical design do a huge amount of storytelling on their own. The result is a film that is often uncomfortable, sometimes shocking, but also unexpectedly tender.
Bottom line
It won’t work for everyone, especially if you want your thriller elements to stay central or your fantasy to remain cleanly symbolic. But for viewers who like their cinema weird, mournful, and morally unsettled, Border is memorable in the best possible way.
Top Letterboxd reviews
stevie (3★) · 1207 likes
I thought this would just be a nice little fairy tale, but instead I got a heartwarming and inspiring film about an ordinary woman discovering she's actually a Top.
c.w. scott (2.5★) · 1072 likes
when a character said that his name was Vore the guy next to me put his head in his hands and sighed
Chris Hormann (3.5★) · 724 likes
That sex scene will haunt me for years. I've got nothing else sorry.
Seamus (3★) · 436 likes
No one in this movie was a good kisser.
Sean Baker · 435 likes
An incredible film. May be my fave of 2018.
Official submission of Sweden for the 'Best Foreign Language Film' category of the 91st Academy Awards in 2019
Screened at Laemmle's Royal Theater.