A nineties pop sensation is forced to fend off the affections of an obsessive fan in this absurdist comedy-thriller from Cocaine Bear writer Jimmy Warden. With Samara Weaving playing the famous musician and Ray Nicholson in the deranged sociopath role, Warden’s directorial debut does a great job of capturing the interest early on.
Breaking into Sofia Minor’s mansion, stalker Paul Duerson (Nicholson) is determined to achieve the perfect wedding, regardless of whether his bride-to-be wants it or not. And, were Borderline a two-hander between Weaving and Nicholson (whose apple did not fall far from the tree), we might have a worthy successor to The Loved Ones on our hands. Unfortunately for us, the water becomes muddied with a whole cast of people who aren’t Samara Weaving or Ray Nicholson.
That’s not to say that the plight of wounded bodyguard Bell (Eric Dane) isn’t interesting, or that we shouldn’t care about his daughter (Yasmeen Kelders), or Sofia’s basketball player boyfriend (Jimmy Fails), all of whom are perfectly… there. The issue is that none of them are Samara Weaving, who’s more than capable of carrying this sort of thing on her shoulders alone. Instead of a taut home invasion thriller about a pop star and her stalker, Borderline is forced to divide its time between that and everything else it has going on.
The fractured, almost Tarantino-esque approach means that neither Nicholson nor Weaving never get to fulfil their full potential, denying one the opportunity to get nuts while holding the other back from another great horror role. As the 1990s setting is largely underutilised, so is the fact that Sofia is supposedly a global pop star (the film is loosely based on a ’90s stalker case involving Madonna). When it does remember, this scores us the best use of Celine Dion in a film since Titanic, and an otherwise well-deployed soundtrack and score.
If this sounds overly harsh, that’s because Borderline has everything it needs to be great. Unfortunately, it’s successes are outweighed by everything that’s not-so-great, including entire sub-plots and characters Warden’s screenplay could have done without. As for Weaving and Nicholson? As well as being its shining stars, they serve as a reminder that they could have elevated the whole thing, if only they’d been allowed the chance.
BORDERLINE is available for streaming on digital platforms now.
