the borderlands

the borderlands (a.k.a final prayer) is a british found footage movie about three men working for the vatican who are tasked with verifying a supposed miracle that occured in a small village church in england. the team includes two priests, mark (aidan mcardle) and deacon (gordon kennedy), and a technician, grey (robin hill), who is responsible for ensuring that everything is recorded. however, not long after the team arrive they being to realise that they may be more to the alleged miracle than first reported.

the first thing that struck me about the borderlands was the familiarity of the setting. i've been to countless small villages like the one in this film, in fact it's not dissimilar to the village in devon where my dad lives. i've always been fascinated with small village churches too, and there is something about quiet, old buildings that's kind of creepy. this film plays on that creepiness perfectly.

the set-up is really interesting and works well for the story. the characters are well-written and acted too, particularly grey and deacon. despite their unusual profession, both characters come across like real people just trying to get a job done. robin hill is particularly great as grey and really puts across a sense of a being your average techie thrown into a very unusual situation. grey's atheism is also an interesting character point, which leads to some interesting debates that are played out in the film.

the horror or supernatural element is really held back in this film, very much to its credit. there are some nice, almost hidden suggestions of spooky goings-on that are really there for the audience to see and not the characters. when things do kick off it's quite unsettling but all of this is really building up to one of the greatest and most terrifying horror endings i've seen in a while. the last five minutes of this film are truly disturbing and it's worth a watch just to experience that moment.

i really enjoyed this one and would definitely recommend you check it out. plus, it's nice to have a british film on the list as there don't seem to be too many found footage films being made over here right now.

the found footage blogathon will run from throughout february, in which time i plan to review as many films as possible and maybe throw in a few extras as well. if you'd like to be involved and post your own content, send me a link via twitter with the tag #foundfootageblogathon. i'll retweet your link and will include it in a summary post next week. you can find a full list of the films i'll be reviewing here.