Borderline

Unless you’re from Eastern Europe, there is a good chance you don’t know that Lithuania shares a border with Russia on the east – as do more Eastern European countries than would like to – and also on the west. It’s a small enclave of Russia called the Kaliningrad Oblast. That’s one of the world’s most interesting geographical phenomena: a giant sand dune spit, divides the two countries on the western edge. That border, even more so than the one on the east, divides the European Union from their biggest enemy. This is a liminal divide – a space between spaces that doesn’t quite make sense. It also makes a compelling setting for Lithuanian director Ignas Jonynas’s latest crime-thriller Borderline.

Set in the small border town of Rusnė, Borderline embraces local culture through fishing and bird watching – two of the activities the city is most known for. Vilius (Šarūnas Zenkevičius), an ornithologist still mourning the loss of his departed wife, gets unintentionally drawn into a border-crossing crime syndicate. He does his best and uses his day job of tracking migration patterns and saving trapped birds (along with the van and tracking equipment that come with the job) in order to alleviate the difficulties of his new crime life. His daughter (Urtė Povilauskaitė) doesn’t talk and experiences life with some mental disabilities, and Vilius’s new life on the edge makes him reevaluate what’s important to him and brings him closer to his daughter.

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