The Borderlands (2013)

title: The Borderlands
directed by: Elliot Goldner
written by: Elliot Goldner
photography by: Eben Bolter
edited by: Mark Towns
cast: Gordon Kennedy, Robin Hill, Aidan McArdle
imdb

The Borderlands is the last found footage movie that I have seen. I have shown openly my skepticism about mockumentaries and found footage, but I can't help falling recurrently with this subgenre. This week I have seen The Den, an acceptable experiment, based mainly on webcam recordings. But before that I have seen The Borderlands, that is one of my Top 5 found footage movies ever (which, on the other hand, doesn't mean a lot, because right now I can't remember not even 5 that I liked).

In The Borderlands we follow a priest and an image and sound techinician (later they will be joined by another priest), sent by the Vatican, as they carry an investigation of the strange phenomena that have taken place in a church in a small village of the West County, in order to establish the nature of them.

The Borderlands has a surprisingly good screenplay, given the limitations of the genre. It doesn't fail at the end, something very common among its genre brothers. So frequently we see this kind of movies, losing its grip at the end, giving us 20 minutes of tunnel, forest, abandonend buidlings, chase ups, that don't add anything, just because the director felt that they had to arrive to the 90 minutes, no matter what. The direction is also really good and the acting is more than correct.

One of the strong things about The Borderlands, is the use of the head cameras, which allows closer shots than other found footage movies. This way it is not restricted to general room shots, or to shaking over the shoulder cameras.

Check our Anthology of Mockumentaries and found-footage.