Since 1993, almost 400 women have been murdered in Juarez, Mexico, a factory town that is home to people who toil away at maquiladoras (border factories), which make cheap consumer goods for the US market.
Bordertown attempts–but fails–to tell the story of Lauren Fredricks (Jennifer Lopez), an ambitious newspaper reporter, who has been sent to Juarez by her editor (Martin Sheen) to investigate what has happened to these hundreds of women.
Grade: C
She is tasked with finding out how the local police and other authorities have been covering up the brutal rapes and murders.
Lauren looks up her former colleague and lover Alfonso Diaz (Antonio Banderas), who now runs the local paper, and they soon uncover one of the hottest stories of the year when they come across the only known survivor of one of these mysterious attacks.
The victim is reluctant to speak, but Lauren convinces her to break the silence; yet the real danger is not the murder, but the larger forces who don’t want the story to be told.
This was the second collaboration between Nava and Lopez, following the 1997’s biopic film, Selena.
A critical and commercial disappointment, Bordertown failed as a crime story, investigative journalism, and even as a star vehicle for Jennifer Lopez, then at the start of her career.
Credits
Distributor: THINKFilm
Directed by: Gregory Nava
Featuring: Jennifer Lopez, Antonio Banderas, Sonia Braga, Martin Sheen
Release Date: August 31, 2007
Rating: R
