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The Borrower

Play trailer Poster for The Borrower R 1991 1h 32m Sci-Fi Play Trailer Watchlist
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30% Tomatometer 10 Reviews 24% Popcornmeter 100+ Ratings
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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The Borrower

Critics Reviews

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Emanuel Levy EmanuelLevy.Com Jun 17, 2005
2/5
Dennis Schwartz Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews Jan 26, 2005
C+
Not without being somewhat entertaining in a childish way. Go to Full Review
Spence D. IGN Feb 10, 2004
3/5
Daniel M. Kimmel Worcester Telegram & Gazette Feb 8, 2004
3/5
Jeffrey Westhoff Northwest Herald (Crystal Lake, IL) May 14, 2003
2/5
Alex Sandell Juicy Cerebellum Mar 27, 2003
2/5
Borrowed from too many other horror movies to be any good. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Robert P @Superbad Sep 21, 2026 The Borrower = a 1.5 star Movie! See more Ross V @RT61232648 Aug 2, 2025 A cheap copy of 1987’s superior, The Hidden, The Borrower’s only notable scene is its very first one which neatly and arrestingly sets the stage for a movie which, beyond some effective practical makeup effects, fails to develop into anything but a meandering interweave of an alien head hunter in L.A. and a mildly threatening whack job sex offender on a kinky vendetta against the protagonist police detective. See more Todd B @RT92383055 Dec 15, 2024 This movie is a weird with a roach like alien space policing a white man prisoner alien. And then changing heads every so often even a dog. It even got freaky, when the guy eat a spoonful of cream corn with a mouse in it. Whereas, he even sucked up all of the pint of vodka or whatever up. See more Jan 9, 2022 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. See more Apr 26, 2016 Before The Bone Collector was this forgettable and similarly themed thriller. See more Jun 27, 2015 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. See more Read all reviews
The Borrower

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Movie Info

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
Producer
R.P. Sekon, Steven A. Jones
Production Co
Atlantic Entertainment Group, Vision Pictures, Cannon Pictures Inc.
Rating
R
Genre
Sci-Fi
Original Language
English
Release Date (Streaming)
Jan 1, 2009
Runtime
1h 32m
Sound Mix
Surround
Aspect Ratio
Flat (1.85:1)
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