Ali Abbasi's 'Border' Explores Gender and Genre in Contemporary Cinema

Ali Abbasi's film 'Border' (2018), based on John Ajvide Lindqvist's short story 'Confine' and co-written with Isabella Eklöf, won the Un Certain Regard award at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival. The film follows Tina, a troll-like customs officer with supernatural abilities, played by Eva Melander, and her relationship with Vore (Ero Milonoff). The narrative blends fantasy, noir, thriller, Nordic folklore, body horror, and romance, challenging distinctions between human and non-human, male and female. Drawing on Teresa de Lauretis's queer theory and Judith Butler's concept of performative bodies, the film deconstructs gender as a symbolic construction shaped by institutional and cultural technologies. Set in pastoral and industrial Sweden, 'Border' operates in a liminal space—porous, hybrid, political, grotesque, and erotic—where identity and sexuality are fluid. The film's protagonist, Tina, embodies otherness through her chromosomal difference and social exile, raising questions about care, reproduction, and the boundaries of humanity. Carlotta Petracci's analysis for Artribune positions the film as a case study in contemporary cinema where gender and genre categories are rendered insignificant.