Reed Alexander's Horror Review of 'The Boarderlands' (2013)

Can I just start off by saying the Shakey Camera style of filming was completely un-fucking-necessary? Imagine the money they wasted on crappy webcams and headsets when they could have just had one or two cameras shooting the whole film. And there were basically no other FX outside of the cinematography so why did they need it? Are filters and lighting honestly so expensive that an indie film would rather burn money on a gimmick? In my review of Alien Abduction (2014), I explain when Shakey Camera is appropriate and in my review of The Taking of Debora Logan (2014) (TDL), I explain when it's not. It boils down to this. Was it necessary because you couldn't afford to make the practical FX look good, or was it necessary because you had no talent for creating atmosphere? In this case, how hard would it be to make such a beautiful set look good with filters and lighting? Again, there were really no practical FX to hide with the Shakey Camera so why go that rout?

Now, this movie never gets as fucking gratuitous with the Shaky Camera as TDL. While there are some points where it's hard to see what's going on, at least it isn't five full fucking minutes of a guy videotaping himself tripping over his own two feet. You can basically see what's going on and the camera view is used more as an effect to accentuate what's going on. That's basically fine, but they could have done the same thing with classical cinematography and it would have looked better.

I don't know, maybe they decided to shoot it that way to make the movie feel more real, more tangible, like Cloverfields (2008). To be honest I feel like they shot it that way to make what is essentially a really bland movie seem more interesting. Nothing is really ever happening for the majority of the movie. Sure, there are some strange noises, sure, stuff moves from time to time, but... that's basically it. If the three main characters weren't constantly bickering, there would be no real drama. Most of the time when the characters do hear or see something interesting, they try to figure out what's causing it and that bit gets old quick. This movie honestly should have just been a short, there's not enough meat on the bone for a feature-length film.

And I guess the plot wasn't really that interesting to begin with. It's about a group that works for the church to investigate miracles. On its face, this movie is only a basic haunted house movie, and we've already seen a dozen of those before. It was at least an interesting take on what's already been done before but literally, all of this has all been done before, save the resolution. I'll have to talk about that in the spoilers, though.

The acting was actually pretty solid, though. Even the extras they had for villagers did great. It was all far better than is required for horror. Better than the acting in TDL. And, again, the setting is just fucking gorgeous. I guess the unnecessary use of shaky camera is forgivable...

But I just can't recommend this movie. It's just too boring and the ending really doesn't save it...

On that note...

SPOILERS!!!

So, the church is built on a 'living thing' in the cosmic horror sense. There is some entity that is sleeping in the remnants of a pagan temple that the church had been built on top of to drive the evil out. I mean that's a cool concept, but show me that there's something alive about the set. Like Event Horizon (1999), show me that the set is alive and it's the actual antagonist. I know that's super hard, but when we get to the end and the building is effectively digesting them, it just seems out of place and confusing. Without showing us the building is alive, it's just a bland haunted house movie and it's all just been done before.

Huge disappointment, give this a skip.