Borges And Me

As the pretext for a period road movie Borges And Me offers a wealth of engaging detail about the relationship between the student and writer Jay Parini (Fionn Whitehead) and his mentor, the blind Argentinian poet Jorge Luis Borges (Luis Gnecco).

Set in the early 1970s director Marc Turteltaub follows the pair across scenic Scottish countryside and seascapes as they journey in a decrepit Morris Minor from St Andrews to Orkney via Inverness and back again. En route each learns from the other as masks of pretension are dropped in an intellectual dance to uncover their true selves just below the surface.

Turteltaub describes the bonds of friendship with delicacy and insight, reflected in the nuanced performances of the central pair (Whitehead and Gnecco) as well as a veritable torrent of Scots acting talent, notably to the fore Peter Mullan as Orcadian poet George Mackay Brown and Alan Cumming as university lecturer, poet and translator Alastair Reid.

Based on the semi-fictional memoir by Parini, it’s beautifully paced and shot with an authentic sense of period. As the journey progresses, more differences are revealed and ultimately common ground reached.

Parini came to Scotland from the States in part to escape conscription to fight in Vietnam and to embark on a doctorate at St Andrews University writing poetry. Borges, with a reputation as surrealist writer and often described as “the father of magical realism," was in the East Neuk town from Argentina to visit Reid and his young son.

Borges, as portrayed by Gnecco, is delightfully eccentric, idiosyncratic and truly subversive as he mounts an assault on his youthful companion’s bland exterior while providing a valuable lesson in the ways of the real world while playing around with words and thoughts.

Whenever the pace shows signs of flagging another colourful character steps in to the breach such as Freya Mavor as a breath of fresh air local who sets her sights on the gauche and conservative Parini. He meets her at the local pub where they seek succour following an unfortunate sortie to Loch Ness after Borges wants to commune with the fabled monster. He falls in the deep and is rescued by the long-suffering Parini. At times the pair resemble another odd couple of legend: Sancho Panza and Don Quixote to whom reference is made.

As well as being a visual feast it’s also a film that takes a rare pleasure in literature, words and ideas to which the cast respond in full measure and, without a doubt, so too will audiences.

Reviewed on: 25 Aug 2026