Borderland (DVD) ★★★★

In the low-budget Borderland, three American college kids (Strong, Presley and Muxworthy) venture down to a small town on the Mexican border to have a little fun before they go their separate ways when they graduate. Unfortunately for them, the intended shenanigans turn into the grisly discovery of a psychotic cult hellbent on human sacrifice, kick-starting a nightmarish scenario of graphic violence and torture in a holiday from hell.

Loosely based on the true story of the Matamoros cult killings of 1989, Borderland is a disturbingly real cinematic portrait of ritual extremism in Mexico. Fueled by cocaine, a group of heartless, twisted drug dealers turn their attention from sacrificing countless Mexicans to "soft" Americans, as apparently their bleeding flesh would make for a better offering to Chango, the God of Thunder, or more specifically, a devil. These ruthless out-of-their-skull maniacs don't let anybody get in their way; armed to the teeth with machetes and a variety of guns, even the police fear them. The film felt a lot like Eli Roth's Hostel (which I loved, and coincidentally Rider Strong was in Roth's first film Cabin Fever) with three young men taking a trip to an alien location, followed by a disappearance and merciless torture. And that's just it, even though the friends are just on the border, it's truly a foreign world; mysterious and unnerving, and the film really captures that.

Zev Berman's direction is frantic and perfectly suited to the eerie and at times violently chaotic nature of the picture. What instantly made me even more of a fan of the film after watching and listening to the director's words is that he only believes in using both the camera and special effects practically. He recalls a company trying to sell digital effects prior to production and him having to fight tooth and nail with Lionsgate to only work practically, which I completely agree with. The performances are top-notch from all and when combined with the blood and guts create some extremely harrowing scenes. In the making of feature, Sean Astin, who plays an especially mindless member of the cult, calls Borderland a splatter film, to which the director responds by saying that it is not a splatter film, but a drama, and that he thrives on intensity, not violence.

This is what separates the film from being just another gore movie; it's a horrific drama with very real undertones. Speaking of Astin, until the credits rolled I didn't even realise that he was in the film. Until this realisation I was just going to write in my review about the "Seth Rogan look-a-like", but Sean, a brilliant actor, plays a character so different to anyone he has ever become before that I am probably not alone in my failure to notice his role. The character of Randall is, compared to Samwise in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Mikey in The Goonies and even his portrayal of the unlikeable Lynn in 24, on a different planet.

There is a chase sequence towards the end of the film that is genuinely terrifying. As a member of the audience, I find horror far scarier when I know that the story being told is based on truth, rather than being a work of complete fiction. As I mentioned the film earlier, Hostel was based on a Thai website Eli Roth stumbled upon that literally sold murder. Just the mere thought of that inspiration is scary, and that is exactly the same with Borderland: an extremely enjoyable 100 minutes full of thrills, spills and shocking drama, all based on a chillingly sinister reality from an exciting director.

EXTRAS *** Commentary with director Zev Berman, 20-minute “Inside Zev's Head” making of feature, the trailer, Rituales de Sangre: The True Story Behind the Matamoros Cult Killings, and six webisodes detailing the Miss Horrorfest 2007 contest.