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We have taken some photos of "Bordertown". They represent actual movie quality.

• Great posted on 14 Aug 2009

  This was a great movie....... I am from El Paso Texas and these killings have been happening approx. since 2003 and this movie really needed to be made so that people can realize that it is happening in my sister city. El Paso and Juarez are in different countries, but they both join into one. So this problem is not only Mexico's, but it is also a problem that the US experiences. The only reason that this movie is not a 10 is because is did have a bit too much drama... but we have to remember all the hell that this movie got not only from Mexican officials, but from Hollywood. So i give mad props to JLo, Antonio, & to everyone who produced/ contributed to this film.

• Excellent film posted on 12 Aug 2009

  This really wasn't the bad film that critics in Europe and on this board are making it out to be!! I saw this movie a few days ago, and it was one of the best movies I've seen in 2007. I am in shock at how ignorant people on here are. This movie was meant to show real life situations that are happening right now at the border towns between united states and Mexico. Jennifer Lopez plays Lauren Adrian, a reporter for the Chicago Sentinel who wants to be a big time news reporter but has to go to Mexico and report what is going on with the murders of these women in the factories. She almost doesn't take the job because she didn't want to have anything to do with Mexico, but is convinced by her boss that she will move on in the business if she does this well. Lopez does a great job in this movie along with Antonio Banderas. The suspense, and horror was there in the movie. Every moment you were scared for your life for this woman who survived being raped and buried in the desert and left for dead. This movie is definitely a must see, and as I read a lot of the commentaries on this movie on here... I NEVER once in the movie heard a "corny" line, dumb "subtle-humor", anything like that. I don't know if it was the way the movie was translated into different languages in Europe, but I saw the English version and it was great the way it was. Excellent script, excellent actors, excellent director. Whether it gets recognition for the good work these people did in the movie, I don't know, I could only hope so. But hopefully this movie will also bring United States the awareness of what is going on in the US/Mexican border towns. See this movie, you will not regret watching this heartfelt drama/thriller.

• Shocking.... posted on 10 Aug 2009

  Its hard to comment on some "true story" movies! This story...true story...it's so shocking and scary and really makes you ask yourself "in what kind of world we are living?".... and that's a good part! It will scares you but it will show you some real life tragedy that happened and that will happen... and it could happen to anyone! You should be aware! So this is really shocking tragedy about brutal life of females on Mexican/USA boarder! And its true!!!So after getting me shocked its really hard to comment on acting, scenes, etc. But I must do that because this is no documentary! And from movie aspect... well... it's not that much! I must admit that Jeniffer Lopez is much better actress than on her first movies but everyone else.... Antonio Banderas has just a short role, nothing special and other actors are not some famous... at least not to me! They are good but....This movie is not for an award but I recommend you to watch it, because it's a true story and it shows hard living, bad politics, corruption, trying to stay alive and you are on your own.......(sorry on my bad English)

• Based on unsolved murders posted on 07 Jul 2009

  I love Jennifer Lopez and Antonio Banderas, having the two together in the same movie looked like it had to be good. As I watched, I didn't really get into the film like some of the other movies with Jennifer Lopez or Antonio Banderas but the story was interesting. As it went on it seemed more plausible and disgusting to think politicians or big corporations sacrifice safety for profit. After watching the movie I found myself reading about the murdered women of Juarez.I will probably watch it again on DVD and recommend others as well, not because it is the most entertaining film, but because the story of the murdered women of Juarez.

• Bordertown review posted on 03 Jul 2009

  There is some really good and some bad in this movie. The Bad: Nava included flashback of Lauren (Jennifer Lopez character) when she was young all along the movie and they are useless, the fact that she talk about it with George (Martin sheen) at the end would have been enough, it kind of distract the intention from the real story of the movie. A scene that i would have removed is the fire scene, not really realistic, the script could have been better. The Good: The cinematography kind of remind me the movie traffic with the yellow and blue and it works well for this movie it give different atmosphere to each places. Great acting : particularly Maya Zapata and Jennifer Lopez, we really believe in this story because of this two, i was really impressed by Maya Zapata she can express many things just with her eyes and she didn't overplayed Eva desperation. Jennifer Lopez believe it or not is amazing here, probably one of her best work in many years, she particularly impressed me in her last scene with Martin Sheen, her all speech was touching and well acted. I hope for her that she will have the opportunity to have challenging role like this one. Even if some scenes aren't well written there is enough good and strong one to make this movie works. I'm glad this movie was made it's an important story to tell.

• Search the Internet for the Real Bordertown Story posted on 01 Jun 2009

  Researching the ill effects of "free trade," the gagging contracts US career lawyers and economists construe for the sole gain of US multi-national corporations in developing nations, who are promised a better material world, I had heard that Bordertown was in the making. At the Berlin film festival writer/producer/director Gregory Nava and his star Jennifer Lopez, as well as producer Barbara Martinez, were convincing in their mission to fashion a movie, loosely based on the facts of continued and brutal rapes with the killing and/or disappearance of many young woman victims that came to Juarez. (Juarez is located across the US-Mexican border bridge connecting El Paso, New Mexico.) Most every feeling being with a conscience will support such an infocational flick, and therefore it hurts to say that the filmmakers failed in their stated, and otherwise laudable aim. The prescription for Hollywood is simply to demand thrilling action so that the adrenaline-seeking crowds will fill the box-office coffers, even though this movie has the looks, feel and production quality that indicate that not much money was spent on it. Besides an above-average amount of "goofs," the emphasis is made on imprecisely-executed chase-and-run scenes, while the development of characters is almost entirely absent due to a rather phlegmatic script.For instance, we find out about the background of the main character, the journalist Lauren Adrian (Jennifer Lopez) during black-and-white flashbacks that can not possible make sense to the most avid moviegoer, until she actually dialogs its meaning during a scene towards the end of the movie. (IMDB lists the character name as Lauren Fredericks.) Her prior relationship with Juarez-based "El Sol" journalist Diaz (Antonio Banderas) is cleverly revealed during dialogs, and it becomes obvious that Lauren had dumped him in the past, that he now had a family he cared for, and that he still loved Lauren enough to keep her out of danger. On the other hand, we learn nothing about the police, who want to avoid any publicity of the brutal murders, and who are shown to be only superficially interested in solving the murders that the movie claims are as many as 4.000, while even Amnesty International describes over 400. Of course, if it was one, it would be objectionable, but why the hype? Is that another sign that the movie wants to built on the sure-fire success of sensationalism, while it can not offer the real goods of a well-developed story with two- and three-dimensional characters, who want a better world, while materialistic psycho- and sociopaths seem to have the upper hand in killing teenage women, who come to work in the free-trade-created factories for about 5 bucks a day. Or that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is written so that US companies can exploit lacking worker safety, virtually non-existent environmental laws, cheap labor and low taxes. To this very day, these companies have not instituted safe transportation for their vulnerable and poverty-stricken women employees during the changing shifts, as these factories never close. All this is not meant to recommend that you don't go and watch the movie, or better to rent it as a DVD. It has at least entertainment value and the acting is acceptable and probably could not be any better, because the script does not give the actors much creative width and depth to re-enact. Indeed the movie has the feel as if it was made under time stress. There are reported stories that the film crew was threatened, and that many scenes were filmed in other Mexican towns that were more hospitable. It has this lets-get-it-over feeling that is also reflected in jumpy, often confusing, editing, and a music score that seems to be a one-take offering. This topic is just too important as to trivialize it in an ill-conceived action flick. But a few scenes are as authentic as they can get. The living conditions of the workers, as the heartless and shrewd consequences of companies like DuPont, General Electric and Alcoa, who must live in slums that are literally created out of cardboard, stolen pallets, old tires and held into place by nails driven through bottle caps. And the scene, were an illegal electric hook-up ends into a fire disaster, has in reality occurred many times. Hollywood will then stage a scene were many loose their "homes" in a fast-moving fire and the most evil killer will just show up during such a disaster as the backdrop and try to kill our beloved journalist. For the real story, enter the string "Juarez murder* women nafta" in your search engine, without the quotes, and get a hold of the real story, which includes drug lords buying into sweat shops (called maquiladoras) and using the "free-zone" infrastructure to transport truckloads of drugs across the bridge and with the railroad into the States along with television sets and monitors, and all the other sweatshop items produced by mostly young women. Our movie will not tell you that and many other aspects, as it busybodies itself with Hollywood-type, often senseless, and carelessly executed action. The topic definitely deserved a masterpiece film to get the message of this exceptionally cruel social and economic disaster across. What a real shame that it missed so badly.

• Impressive, atmospheric thriller telling an unbelievable true life story posted on 31 Mar 2009

  STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning Based around the true story of a series (or reportedly over a thousand!) cases of rape and murder of women in the Mexican town of Juarez, this has Jennifer Lopez as Lauren Adrian, an ambitious reporter who is sent to the town to investigate the crimes in exchange for getting a Foreign Correspondents job from her boss (Martin Sheen.) Once there, she runs into an old flame (Antonio Banderas) and learns the police are prohibiting any media discussion on the cases. She also comes into contact with Eva (Maya Zapata) who has survived an attack by the killer and has crawled out of her own grave. The young woman believes the devil himself is committing these crimes. A more cynical Lauren wants a flesh and blood suspect- but a haunting wall of silence is standing in her way.Any film with a political subtext is always going to run into controversy, but Bordertown would appear to have been a bigger victim than any other. It's facing a straight to DVD release in the US and if that happens, I can't see it faring any better over here, to be honest. The reason for the hush up of it's existence, it would appear, is so the US maintains good relations with the government of Mexico, and avoids pointing the finger at it and crying 'corruption.' That's the theory anyway, but if events have played out like they have in Bordertown there's little to prove the film wrong.One thing this impressive but grim film must be noted for is Lopez's performance in the lead role. She's really improved as an actress here, not trying too hard or over emoting anymore, just carrying the film with a natural air and grace that the role requires. She has good support, too, in the shape of Zapata, Sheen and Banderas, all giving their roles their all and making the story more dynamic as a result. Director Gregory Nova adds a tense air of mystery and dread to the tale, with some neat seat edge moments and constant air of danger.As if this disturbing and unsettling story isn't jolting enough, imagine how I felt watching it on my new widescreen Sony TV and thinking: the women in the story may have made that, working and going to/from work in the unfair and unsafe environment they do. Hell, even the laptop I'm writing this on now may have been made by them. As well as providing a thrilling but haunting true life story, Bordertown also opens your eyes to the equivalent of modern slave labour that provides us westerners with every luxury we enjoy and the true cost it comes at. ****

• Barely above average posted on 15 Mar 2009

  Presenting like a made for TV movie, this film had some memorable moments as a suspense thriller. However, it does a lousy job of telling the stories of the murdered women in Juarez. As pure entertainment, the story was good. Its always fun to see and hear Juanes and at least the performances were convincing enough to allow me to care about the characters and the plot. However, the oftentimes formulaic and stereotyped presentation of the characters pulled this film down and insulted my intelligence. The tryst between Jennifer Lopez' character and the factory owner was completely gratuitous. It is a shame that the made for TV production quality cheapened the story. There were times when I expected the most interesting man in the world to pop out from the shadows saying "I don't often drink beer but when I do, I prefer Dos Equis." Its worth a dollar as a grocery store DVD but not much more.

• Jennifer Lopez is actually decent in this posted on 07 Mar 2009

  This movie was OK and Jennifer Lopez was not her usual terrible self. She plays a journalist, Lauren, who goes to a Mexican town to investigate the murders of young women. The numbers are reported to be in the hundreds but are actually in the thousands. The government wants to hide it. A young woman survives one of the attacks and Lauren wants to interview her but certain people want to prevent that from happening. She gets help from a guy who runs a local paper. She begins to find out that some important, rich people may be connected to the murders. She sets herself up as bait and gets a terrifying experience. But in the end the whole story remains unsolved.The story was somewhat interesting and easy to follow.FINAL VERDICT: If you like Lopez, then you'll like this. If you come across it on cable, it's worth watching.

• A failed movie, though its worthy intention posted on 07 Dec 2008

  This is not the kind of movie I usually see, and I must admit that while watching it on TV, I gradually realized that it was not the documentary film I expected. The story is based on a horrifying and tragic reality of raping and killing of women on the Mexican border, of which I did not know anything, as underreported throughout the world. The movie has so the laudable merit of bringing to light and denouncing the terrifying drama of thousands of women being raped and disappeared in those waste lands, working in those appalling "maquilladoras", where even the most basic human rights are completely disregarded, and where deep economic interests prevail over respect for human dignity. However, as the story progressed, I realized it was more an action-thriller than a documentary picture, standing out for gripping though improbable, twists, a tense and quick pace, intertwined with some more relaxed and relaxing moments, which appear as really improbable and above all of bad taste and out of place if we consider the grave topic of the movie. It is as if that worthy aim gives way to more entertaining and market needs. So my doubt was: how can such a highly committed movie be bent to the logic of the box-office? How can you shift your attention from scenes of rape of terrifying violence to the underlining of J. Lo's perfect silhouette? It is evident that the production aimed at attracting audience through an attractive cast and some shrewd devices, such as pacing action, a thriller-plot, sentimental flash-backs, some entertaining music, thus losing its seriousness and credibility. I watched it till the end, because it was gripping and, like all thriller movies, you want to know how it ends up, but I realize this is not the reason why I should have wanted to see it till the end, and in this sense I think it is, in the end, a failed movie.

• Powerful! Thought-provoking! posted on 29 Nov 2008

  Jennifer Lopez stars as a fictional Chicago newspaper reporter turned on to story regarding the women of Juarez, Mexico, and the deplorable conditions they're forced to live under in order to care for their families. But a story based on adverse conditions quickly turns to a story of murder and big business cover-ups when a girl left for dead out in the desert after being attacked turns up with a story too juicy for Lopez to pass up.This is a film that stirs any human being. I'm sorry, but if this movie does not touch your heart, than you are either one of those big businesses taking advantage of NAFTA or you're inhuman. I turned this movie on because Lopez was in it, but I stuck around for the story line, one that could make your heart sink, just thinking that someone who lives right around the corner in middle America could have a hand in covering something like this up. Normally, I comment on the movie and whether it was done right, good, and believable, but I can't get past the message in this film! Watch it! 7 out of 10 stars!

• The anti-trade angle harms the film posted on 25 Nov 2008

  The film does attempt to depict actual events; however, I have to wonder how much is enhanced for dramatic effect. First of all, the anti-NAFTA angle is at best disingenuous. Maquiladoras did not start with NAFTA, they had been in existence previously contrary to what the movie suggests. Secondly, the implication that there is some utopian protectionist alternative isn't born about by any evidence. Many people have come to the border area to work in the factories but their wages are generally higher than the areas they came from and lest anyone think Mexico was crime free prior to NAFTA should watch "Los Olvidados" a film about violent youths in Mexico City in 1950. Also, the notion newspapers were somehow unconcerned with the "bottom line" in the past is also a reach.I will say the film tries to depict the gritty life that exists on the US Mexican border and certainly the murders are gruesome and the police have been ineffective at best in solving the crimes. However, the notion of some evil capitalist conspiracy seems to originate from the story writer's emotions.

• J.Lo. is terrible posted on 09 Nov 2008

  I can't believe the mild reviews that I read here.Am I the only one that's appalled by J'Lo's lack of artistic skills? Of course,there are some other things that are wrong with the movie,but honestly,if a REAL actress would have played the lead,and did it reasonably well,this movie would have deserved a 6 or 7. What kills the movie is J.Lo,some foolish parts of the script and mostly where that script was heading towards the end of the movie. The points I give are for some realistic scenes,the guts to tackle such a subject and some very good cinematography. The way J.Lo.Plays the character is completely obnoxious and WRONG.The scenes where she's supposed to be energetic are more like a spoiled brat wanting to be spanked,the emotional or romantic scenes have the depth of a hand job and the tense action "live or die" parts had the texture of a domestic dispute.As for the moral thing...give me a break,you got the rocks bimbo and you dwell in your vanity,you're as believable as a hooker in a convent. Kudos for the cinematography,Banderas and the topic,very gruesome and complex indeed, but casting J.Lo was a bad idea.

• Money -v- Lives posted on 10 Sep 2008

  As a massive JLO fan I was keen to watch this movie regardless of the subject, I would watch anything with my beloved Jennifer in.This film was shocking and is yet another classic example of the appalling world we live in as regards money being seemingly more important than human lives and human suffering.It sickened me to see innocent women treated in such a way just so big business and fat cats can get their hands on yet more cash while people suffer as a consequence. It demonstrated everything that is wrong with this horrible world we are forced to live in.I found the movie quite slow going at first and the second half was much more entertaining than the first. It made me pleased that the murderer/rapist was banged to rights - if only they could get all the other evil people too.I thought Banderos was rubbish in this film and was somewhat below him in respect of the material he was given to work with. Jennifer Lopez fits any type of movie and as usual I found her acting and part to be spot on (but then I am somewhat biased of course.) It's nice to see JLO do this type of film and I hope very much that she agrees to do other movies in a similar vein.There was not much eye-candy on view - those horrible slacks JLO wore throughout the movie did nothing to show off her fantastic booty and hips and made her look so damn plain.I enjoyed the movie and place it about halfway in my league table of favourite JLO movies.Definitely worth a watch by everyone.

• Bordertown is a very interesting movie posted on 31 Aug 2008

  Bordertown is a very interesting movie which is sadly based on real events.This movie has very good intentions and its main porpoise is to make conscience to the spectators about some atrocities which happened in the real life.I truly admired the intention of this movie.The performances are surprisingly good.Jennifer Lopez and Antonio Banderas are not usually good actors but they could bring honest and natural performances.Also,they both show that,with the correct director,they can be very competent actors.Director Gregory Nava created a good atmosphere in this movie and he found the correct style for telling the story.A fail I found on this movie are some scenes which are a little bit boring.I think they could have easily been edited.Bordertown is not an excellent movie but it's a very interesting one and I can recommend it.

• "You Got Too Deep !" posted on 13 Aug 2008

  This is a rare kind of movie. The real political thriller (where "thriller" doesn't preponderate "political") is not that available. I only remember movies like Costa-Gavras' Z, Oliver Stone's JFK, and few more. (Bordertown), despite some minor weak points, comes simply without much noisiness to join the list of their elite.The script is the first hero here. It's loosely based on a series of unsolved murders in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, an industrial border town near El Paso, Texas. Where innumerable young women have been kidnapped, tortured and murdered since 1993. It is a master choice when you find a story as rich as this especially when it got : a crime where the thrilling try to know the killer, chase him, then escape from his plots + a shadow, for this same hunt, for a bigger culprits including nations, firms and certain agreements + the realistic factor where the story is based on true events and live happenings still, unfortunately, happen ! Actually it could be the perfect movie for me; giving the hot time, the emotional case, the true story and the pungent satire. It's that capably dark to an extent gives you suffocation's feeling during the watching. And it is that intensive to the extent where one watching is surely not enough.There are many powerful points : the matter of Lopez's dyed hair as a way to disguise herself away from her truth, or to escape from her painful past or rather roots. Or the moment of Lopez getting out of the dirty factory with all the female workers after facing the rotten businessman; the way it was shot made her as if she's the conscience of this wronged nation. I must refer to the sequence when Lopez dressed like a factory girl; once because the driver takes her to another location this time while the police is waiting in totally different one (smart thrill), and once more because the movie makers didn't waste the chance to make the heroine discover accidentally a collective cemetery (another lethal putrefaction like there are more free killers, or that this community is stricken with a genocide of corruption!).On more deep level; look at the main character and its journey, she's firstly not that ideal fighter, she accepted the mission for just a professional promotion, but she goes through what makes it a self's case when she meets her tortured inner teenager in the surviving victim and seeks the revenge for them both out of the same circumstances or culprit. Let alone the hidden connection between that poor isolated factory on the border and the giant American electronics' business. Or the suppression that these companies compel so certain issues can't go public (it would push you to ask yourself why Britney Spears is on the head of news for nearly everyday while more important, urgent and effective stories didn't even see the light !!). And last but not the least, the clever basic symbol about the main 2 criminals, the bus's driver and the rich statesman; namely the ordinary inside putridity, and the authority's corruption that could sell the dignity or the safety of a nation to its enemies; it's where the rapist killer is – literally and metaphorically – the politician.However, nothing is fully perfect. There are some points that bothered me the most. First of all the explicit fabrication of the end's scenes when all the duel's parties gathered illogically in one place while one fire to achieve the poetic justice at its best ! Add to that : the absence of the reason why Lopez's parents got killed ? The way Lopez was shooting all the buses' drivers with an obvious camera while nobody objected ? The strangeness of the attempt to kill Lopez and Banderas (looks like something had been done after the movie completed then added to the finished material later !). And finally the lost fact about the relationship that could gather a bus driver and a rich statesman !Aside from that, the cinematography is the second hero here, being artistically realistic. Just observe the presence of the dark colors, especially the black, all the time. It's like a hurt hurting chromatic scream against injustice or the fat cartels as the real new devil. The pace is genius to deliver all the action and sorrow in one movie. And originally the direction handled the job finely (rare time to witness that in a movie was written and directed by the same person).The cast did it right. But it was Lopez who got me utterly. She owned the screen, being sensitive, struggler, wounded, and believe it or not so sexy as well ! Anyhow, I think that the appearance of some Latino stars in this movie makes it a manifesto more than the Hollywood thriller. Speaking of which, while the movie is produced by Möbius Entertainment ?? Having none of the major studios' emblems at the start ?!, you've got to ask why Hollywood doesn't involve in this kind of movies very ? Maybe because Hollywood, the basically entertaining Hollywood, is a part of the fat cooperated America that this movie encounters. For example at the same year of (2006) Hollywood gave us many movies with female leads and hot duels but such as (Silent Hill), (The Grudge 2), (UltraViolet), (Underworld: Evolution)…I think my point is so clear! Sometimes it's hard to believe but America, the home of freedom, does have problems with freedom, selecting or forcing sometimes not to explore the innermost.

• Important subject; routine film. posted on 09 Aug 2008

  All these young women are being murdered in and around Juarez. Nobody knows who's doing it or why. (True enough, though not often noted in the American press.) The editor of a Chicago newspaper (Martin Sheen) sends an ambitious reporter (Jennifer Lopez) to Juarez to investigate the events and report back to him. In Juarez, Lopez hooks up with an ex-lover (Antonio Banderas) who now runs the fictional newspaper Sol de Juarez. His is the only local paper taking the wave of murders seriously, the others treating them as minor incidents, perhaps the result of domestic violence. This is also the view of the police, who don't want to stir up any local muck. So Lopez and Banderas run into obstacles all along the way, even when they take under their wing a young woman who has almost miraculously survived an attack.The movie suggests that the real culprits here are the American-funded factories that were built in the border towns after the passage of NAFTA. The girls who work in these sweat shops, the maquiladoras, are not worth protecting -- not at four dollars a day -- and so are expendable because there are always more lining up for the jobs.This is a simple-minded explanation of a revolting, complicated, tragic and fascinating social problem. Some men, somewhere, have learned that it is easy to rape and murder a young woman around Juarez, bury her body in the desert, and walk away from it. And the movie slips us a formula, like an an easily swallowed pill, along the lines of "B is a function of A." Plot aside, the development of events is confusing. I lost track of the identity of some of the characters and their motives. The movie never sinks to the obvious level of a stereotypical slasher film, though. It's ambition prevents it, and presumably the writer and director's taste. The action scenes are handled fairly well.The photography is a distraction. It's in high contrast, such that if, in a sunlit room, a figure moves into the shadows, it disappears into the blackness while the rest of the environment remains an eye-numbing glare. And the images are in saturated yellow, seeming to overheat all the surfaces and turn them grimy and even more squalid than they already are. At night, they are blue but the same effect is achieved.There's nothing wrong at all with the performances. Jennifer Lopez is no longer the sex bomb of yesteryear but she's acquired more character as an actress, still has that enduring mandible and cantilevered rear end. Antonio Banderas, I like. The guy isn't exactly handsome but has a face and demeanor that are at once masculine and sympatico. Martin Sheen may be a little weak, or perhaps it's his formulaic lines being shouted over the roar of giant newspaper printers. ("Incredible humanity.") I wish this well-intentioned film had been better than it is. I think it's a mistake to simplify complex social problems into a conflict between a good side and a simple, single bad side. But that generates an even more disturbing thought. Suppose the film makers were right to boil this anfractuous story down into its bundle of two oppositions? Suppose the average viewer is unable any longer to grasp the multivaried aspects of a wave of unrelated murders of young women? Or -- well, not UNABLE to grasp complexity, just unwilling to put out the effort to do so? How much easier to pick a villain and stick to it. How much more appealing to an impatient public. How much more commercial. Even if genuine ambiguity must be thrown out the window.

• Profit is put above humanity. posted on 07 Aug 2008

  Produced and starring Jennifer Lopez, BORDERTOWN is a compelling story that happens in Juarez, Mexico amid the NAFTRA controversy. Mexican border towns are gripped in fear as women factory workers are attacked, raped and killed or left for dead every day. The editor of the Chicago Sentinel George Morgan(Martin Sheen)sends an ambitious reporter, Lauren Adrian(Lopez)to investigate the murders and she ends up with the story of her lifetime. A young woman(Maya Zapata)actually survives an attack and Adrian decides to go undercover with the help of a journalist friend(Antonio Banderas)to expose the truth about the out of controlled murders in Juarez. Her findings are immersed with corruption that extends to both sides of the border. The story is engrossing, but the ending is so ridiculous. Albeit, kudos to writer and director Gregory Nava.

• not particularly attractive posted on 06 Jul 2008

  Jennifer Lopez performance is commendable as well as other supportive roles (Antonio Banderas, Martin Sheen); it's about a story that needs to be told, a disturbing tale - due to the subject handled - that could have been more compelling if it were less clichéd. Nevertheless it's not that easy to judge negatively a film not badly acted and trying to bring attention to such a problem, something different from usual human rights matter - this one is of public ignorance. To sum up I wouldn't define it a mediocre motion picture but "Borders" is not even that far from being a b-movie. Reviewers slammed it and they probably exaggerated but I expected something better.

• See the Film, Pass the Word: A Call for Involvement in Public Action posted on 21 May 2008

  BORDERTOWN is more than a suspenseful film about a tragic reality that has been terrifying Juarez, Mexico for years. This film, written and directed by Gregory Nava ('Mi Familia', 'El Norte', 'Selena', etc), approaches a public service campaign on the part of Nava and the rest of his cast and crew - especially producer/star Jennifer Lopez. After the stunning effect of the film, the viewer is encouraged to watch the several excellent featurettes on the DVD - and then try to remain uninvolved.Chicago Sentinel editor George Morgan (Martin Sheen) convinces the reluctant reporter Lauren Adrian (Jennifer Lopez) to fly to Juarez, Mexico to cover a combustible story about the ongoing rapes and murders of women who work the factories along the border for little pay. Lauren would prefer becoming a foreign correspondent and extracts a promise that if she takes on this ugly assignment ('I don't speak Spanish and I don't know anything about Mexico'), Morgan will grant that request. When the beautiful blond Lauren arrives in Juarez she is shocked by the reality: a very young factory worker girl Eva (the fine young actress Maya Zapata) has managed to survive a rape and attempted murder, literally climbing out of her grave and escaping. Lauren and Eva bond and Lauren realizes that her story about the 5000 victims of this heinous serial killing may just rest with the information Eva holds: she can identify her assailants. With the aid of anxious newspaper owner Alfonso Diaz (Antonio Banderas) the three begin the dangerous struggle to unveil the truths about the cover-up of the deaths: the police and government corruption in Mexico are matched by similar deeds in the USA in order to protect the NAFTA arrangement which apparently holds the profit of the mega-factories of more importance then the mere lives of thousands of Mexican women. How the trio infiltrates the corruption (and the buried secret realities of Lauren's humble beginnings) provide the remainder of the film.Nava elects to shoot this film in garish light and emphasizes the tragic filth and mire of the living conditions of the peasants along the border - each hoping to escape the life situations by crossing into the US. He manages to maintain a coarse cinematic effect that enhances the story. Not only Is Lopez in top form, but also she is assisted by a fine cast of fellow actors including Sonia Braga, Juan Diego Botto, Zaide Silvia Gutiérrez, Rene Rivera among others. Yes, the story has been told before, but that only means there are many people who want this contemporary tragedy to end. In one of the features on the DVD we are given addresses and names to contact to help stop this horrendous 'feminicide'. Take serious note. Grady Harp