ABSTRACT
Bodies become complex borders in numerous new feature fi lms. Physical bodies are far more than the mere narrative characters in the fi lms considered here: Leaking blood and tears, a body-usually that of a border crosser-is a porous cultural space like the border itself, often a dangerous “no (wo)man’s land” where protection from violations of all types is absent.2 The torn bodies and their ripped clothing, as well as interethnic relationships, are frequently the battleground for contesting loyalties. By extension bodies of water as a fl uid “third space” divide, as well as offer hope for connection.3 The masking or exposing performance of bodily transformation often transgresses cultural and moral boundaries. With a supporting cast of the slippery high-tech border crossers of globalization (for example, cell phones, Internet graphics, digital and television cameras, jets, search helicopters, transnational companies), these applications of body, among many others, serve as double-edged cinematic tropes revealing the promises and failures of contemporary hybridity.
