DVD Review: Borderland

Inspired by true events, Borderland plays much like Hostel in Mexico. Having served in San Diego many moons ago, I can attest that warnings about about traveling into Mexico are unceasing. I even had a friend end up in jail there for three days, with a broken neck! So when I watched Borderland, I could truly believe that this was based on reality.

The film is about three Texas friends, about to go off to college, who venture across the border into Mexico for a night of munching shrooms and general rabble-rousing. Problems arise when one falls for a hooker, the other falls for a bar maid and the last one thinks he's invincible. Needless to say, these guys get caught up in some serious shitake!! You see, there's a cartel doing business that also happens to dabble in some Mexican voodoo, and it seems that they use the screams of terrified Americans to feed their god. So, when one of the friends stupidly accepts a ride from the most dangerous dudes in town, it's up to the other two, the bar maid and an ex-cop, who already had one run-in with the baddies, to try and save the kid.

For all intent and purposes Borderland was a good movie. It kept me interested and a little creeped out that this stuff really does happen in this goofy world. The Hollywood artistic freedom however, always seems to ruin it though. SPOILER ALERT -- In a compound of about fifty cultists, how come only about four or five come out to take on the three good guys? Does that make sense? Plus, the biggest baddie in the movie (the bald dude) gets taken out in a really weak way, nothing like the revenge you would have loved to see. But other than that, Borderland is pretty decent, at least better than a lot of the other After Dark Horrorfest films out there. It gets *** out of ***** chalupas.