Border (15)
Directed by Ali Abbassi

THIS is one of those rare films that the less you know about beforehand the better so that you can experience its breathtaking uniqueness and ingenuity. It’s one of the most surreal films of the year and takes Scandi-noir fantasy to a whole new bizarre level.

It’s based on the short story Grans by John Ajvide Lindqvist — who wrote Let the Right One In — and like the latter, Border plays around with the genre, providing plenty of surprises.

The film centres on Tina (an extraordinary Eva Melander), a Swedish customs guard who can literally sniff out fear and guilt on those crossing the border.

But then she meets a strange traveller Vore (Eero Milonoff) who she can’t place and her world is upended when she falls for him.

Due to her unusual looks, she has always felt an outsider and she confides to Vore that when she was a little girl she thought she was special but when she became an adult she realised she was just a strange human being with a chromosome flaw. Vore tells her that isn’t the case.

The film tackles gender politics, immigration and illegal aliens within the construct of a dark Nordic fairytale. Ingenious and unexpected in its many twists and turns, just as you think you know where the story is heading it does a complete U-turn and takes you somewhere you never imagined it would go. It is brutal, explicit and frankly unbelievable.

Co-writer and director Ali Abbassi delivers a truly imaginative and original multi-layered feature which is difficult to define but which is completely gripping and mesmerising.

This bonkers Scandi ride, the hidden gem in last year’s London Film Festival, is one to go and enjoy.