Borderline

This film starts out okay, with a great cast, decent acting, and a premise that one feels might be a pretty entertaining black comedy... but the whole thing doesn't really amount to anything.

The writing here feels improvised, like random wacky and edgy ideas are being thrown into a blender to hopefully result in a crazy modern cult favourite.

You can almost hear somebody wetting themselves at jokes that your uncle might tell at a party that no-one laughs at, or like an SNL sketch that never made the cut and was not broadcast.

The confidence in this material to produce and release this film seems as delusional as the title character.

It's probably not as bad to other viewers as it is to me, but sometimes disappointment in something I thought was going to be great feels like I'm being ripped off or something.

Is this the best movie I've ever seen? Obviously not but it's fun. And at least it's not another remake! I don't get why some people are super low balling the rating for this. It's a solid 5/6, not a 2, or the 8s I've seen, but hopefully that counteracts the 2s. It's a fun dark comedy. Definitely silly at times but go with it and allow it to be silly. I thought the cast was good. Though it seems Samara is getting a bit type casted in these roles. Ray Nicholson looks just like his father but hes pretty good at playing crazy. This movie made me laugh and it was a good choice for a rainy weekend afternoon. Not everything has to be a masterpiece, this is original and paced well.

Samara Weaving is a delight to watch. She's let down by a bad script and direction that is tonally all over the place. Ray Nicholson is campy and over the top, so if that's your thing you're in luck. He's too zany to ever be truly threatening. The characters behave in irrational ways just to make the plot happen. It's quirky and off beat but none of the humor really lands (the funniest bits are Ms. Weavings facial expressions to the craziness around her). The only reason this was set in the '90s is tonget around the ubiquity of cell phones. I'm not sure the movie knows what it's supposed to be and just ends up being a muddled mess. The film was competently shot and does look good.

I love Samara Weaving, and I'm happy to see Alba Baptista gaining space in an international production, but not even that saved Borderline from being a frustrating experience. For 90 minutes, all I could think was: "what the hell is this?"

The film tries to be an eccentric thriller with touches of dark humor, but it completely fails to balance the genres. There's no tension, no coherence, not even a solid script. It's a mess of scenes crashing into each other, as if the story is always on the verge of making sense but then refuses to follow a logical path.

The biggest problem is this lack of focus. Borderline seems to want to be everything at once but never commits to anything. Some moments suggest an intense thriller, while others try to lean into absurd comedy, but nothing really works. The humor falls flat because it lacks timing and impact, and the suspense never actually builds up, making it hard to feel engaged in the story. When it finally seems to find its direction, it quickly loses itself again, as if it's afraid of taking itself too seriously.

That said, I can't deny that Samara Weaving and Ray Nicholson carry the film on their backs. She continues to showcase impressive versatility in her roles, and he delivers a fantastic performance that makes me believe he'll become a major force in the industry in the coming years.

Another positive is the soundtrack, which, while not enough to save the film, adds a few moments of atmosphere. But overall, Borderline is an experience that won't appeal to everyone. It had all the ingredients to be a fun and unpredictable thriller, but instead, it's an exercise in patience, kind of stupid and never quite sure of what it wants to be.

Borderline certainly has its moments, especially in the first and second acts, with events unfolding at a rapid pace and characters getting established. I could easily buy Samara Weaving as a 90s pop star (who needed to sing a lot more in the film), Ray Nicholson as a romantic stalker-sociopath (man, this guy's got the presence and the "killer" smile!), and Eric Dane as a bodyguard (somehow, the protagonist?). Alba Baptista also gets a notably wacky role. The performances are pretty good, the lighting choices are great, and the colour palette is interesting. And oh yes, I really enjoyed the soundtrack.

What doesn't hit a home-run, for me, is basically the watered-down third act (..even when there are enough stabbings and some darkly funny moments). The film desperately needed more of Ray Nicholson than the rest, but the man simply chews up the scenery whenever he's present. The showdown between Samara Weaving and Alba Baptista was enjoyable. It's just that the film can't entirely stick the landing in terms of its tonality, thereby not ending up as memorable given the potential we see early on. Also, they didn't give the romance angle (between Sofia & Rhodes) any real build-up, and it ends up looking weak as hell.