The Borrower

R

1991

1 hr. 37 min.

Sci-Fi

List

30%

10 Reviews

Tomatometer

16%

100+ Ratings

Audience Score

An alien is banished from his planet and sentenced to live on Earth in human form. There's one problem with his disguise, though -- every so often, his human head explodes, revealing his true identity. This leaves the alien with no choice but to intermittently pop off the heads of arbitrary people and use them until it's time for a replacement. Meanwhile, officers Diana (Rae Dawn Chong) and Charles (Don Gordon) begin to trace the trail of headless bodies back to their extraterrestrial source.

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Audience Member

Really silly body swap movie. This premise has been done to death, so you're not likely to be seeing something new, but it's fun and has some performances and situations that are a riot.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

01/09/22

Full Review

Audience Member

Before The Bone Collector was this forgettable and similarly themed thriller.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

02/19/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Classic silliness. An alien is made to look human and exiled to Earth as a punishment...where he gets to keep killing, ripping off heads and wearing women's sunglasses. Despite this movie being incredibly silly, there is some interesting social commentary on our desensitization of violence and automatic devaluation of the poor. Quite good actually and very entertaining.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

02/27/23

Full Review

Audience Member

It was like two different movies fighting with each other to be on the screen. One movie: An alien comes to earth and needs to steal people's heads by ripping them off and placing them on his body. The other movie: A street-wise cop is trying to stop an escaped criminal. You'd think they mesh together, but they really don't. Maybe at the end they sort of do, but it was entirely unnecessary. Besides, the ending is very anticlimactic and solves absolutely nothing (it almost seemed as if they were trying to leave the door open for a sequel). I like the comedy/sci-fi/horror thing they were going for, but the whole Rae Dawn Chong storyline of the movie gets unnecessarily dark at one point (a woman cop gets beat down, tied up, and raped). What was the point? It brought down the mood of the movie and sapped out some of the fun. Still, there's lots of blood and gore, some memorable and funny scenes (the dog being one of them), and it was an okay watch. This movie kind of deserves a DVD treatment, but I guess this will just be one of those forgotten VHS movies that many will remember from the video store days only to be forgotten over time. If you find a bootleg it's worth checking out.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

01/25/23

Full Review

Audience Member

This was one of those movies that was so awful it was funny.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

02/06/23

Full Review

Audience Member

80s comedy horror,not bad worth a watch if your into this kind of thing. some of the gore effects are great especially seeing as this is low budget,but some are pretty bad as well the alien in the suit at the start is comedy gold.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

01/30/23

Full Review

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John McNaughton

Director

Rae Dawn Chong

Diana Pierce

Don Gordon

Charles Krieger

Antonio Fargas

Julius

Tom Towles

Bob Laney

Neil Giuntoli

Scully

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Kathleen Maher

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Rated: 2/5

Jan 1, 2000

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Emanuel Levy

EmanuelLevy.Com

Rated: 2/5

Jun 17, 2005

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Dennis Schwartz

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Not without being somewhat entertaining in a childish way.

Rated: C+

Jan 26, 2005

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Spence D.

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Rated: 3/5

Feb 10, 2004

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Daniel M. Kimmel

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Rated: 3/5

Feb 8, 2004

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Jeffrey Westhoff

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Rated: 2/5

May 14, 2003

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Synopsis

An alien is banished from his planet and sentenced to live on Earth in human form. There's one problem with his disguise, though -- every so often, his human head explodes, revealing his true identity. This leaves the alien with no choice but to intermittently pop off the heads of arbitrary people and use them until it's time for a replacement. Meanwhile, officers Diana (Rae Dawn Chong) and Charles (Don Gordon) begin to trace the trail of headless bodies back to their extraterrestrial source.

Director: John McNaughton
Rating: R
Genre: Sci-Fi
Original Language: English
Release Date (Streaming): Jan 1, 2009
Sound Mix: Surround

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