Return to Paradise
USA 1998
Reviewed by Jamie Graham
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
College graduates Sheriff, Tony and Lewis are enjoying the final days of their five-week holiday in Penang, Malaysia. They crash a hired bike and throw it over a cliff. Later Sheriff and Tony leave their hashish supplies with Lewis, who has decided to stay longer.
Two years later cab driver Sheriff and engineer Tony are working in New York. Their lives are disrupted by Beth, a lawyer who informs them that Lewis has spent the last two years in a Malaysian jail and is going to be executed in eight days' time; the police, investigating the missing bike, found the hashish and charged Lewis with trafficking. His only hope is for Sheriff or Tony to come forward and admit that some of the stash was theirs, although they may be jailed as well as a result. Tony says he will return to Malaysia, but only if the reluctant Sheriff agrees as well. Sheriff eventually gives in to Beth's pressure, not least because they have become lovers.
In Malaysia, Beth lets it slip that she is Lewis' older sister. Tony reacts by flying back to New York, but Sheriff stays. After hearing Sheriff's confession, the prosecutors agree to lessen the charges against Lewis, but news arrives of a vehement anti-Malaysian article in an American newspaper. The enraged judge sentences Lewis to death immediately. Beth assures the now-imprisoned Sheriff that he will be released in six months and promises to wait for him.
Review
A crisis-of-conscience drama in which two friends must decide whether to sacrifice several years of their own lives to save that of a third, Return to Paradise (based on Pierre Jolivet's Force Majeure) is, as Hollywood product currently goes, a relatively gritty affair. At its best, it has that raw quality so often associated with 70s films such as Mean Streets. Particularly impressive is the opening montage of camcorder footage - which follows the trio through five colourful Malaysian weeks - and the brutal conclusion. But the harsher, more effective sequences are diluted by a steady stream of Hollywood clichés and ersatz sentiment. One suspects many of the cruder elements were jostled into place when director Joseph Ruben (Money Train, Sleeping with the Enemy), himself no stranger to slick but crass output, engaged the services of Wesley Strick, author and script-doctorer of The Saint and Final Analysis. However, whatever or whoever the cause, the final blend of arty touches, commercial melodrama, savagery and syrup is an unhappy one.
This is never more evident than in the central relationship between Vince Vaughn and Anne Heche, both of whom surmount considerable obstacles to give excellent performances. As two indie actors who have only recently dipped their toes into the mainstream, they would surely be aware that their characters' falling in love - shoehorned in to make the tragedy more palatable - isn't very credible. And yet they manage to invest their relationship with both passion and tenderness. Such chemistry bodes well for their casting as Norman Bates and Marion Crane in Gus Van Sant's upcoming shot-by-shot remake of Psycho.
Vaughn has the added millstone of having to hold our attention as he slowly evolves from cold-hearted loner to saintly saviour, a man willing to go to jail to salvage a friend's life. It's an all-important transmutation that the film-makers' signpost every step of the way. When his Sheriff informs Heche's Beth that, "I don't have that kind of stuff in me," it is patently obvious that he'll find it soon, for the sake of the drama if nothing else. Hence when Lewis hugs Sheriff and tells him, "I knew you'd come back... even if you didn't [know it]," one can't help but nod in jaded agreement.
Even the shock ending - abruptly introduced, and reinforced by stark natural light - is softened somewhat by at least two slyly placed omens which fortell it. There is Sheriff's early warning to Tony that, "just because you do something good doesn't mean there'll be a happy ending", and a sub-plot involving Jada Pinkett Smith as a journalist who wants to break the story early and shame the Malaysian government into releasing Lewis, a clumsy device present only to manipulate the plot's final, horrifying twist. Such cumbersome tactics are sprinkled throughout Return to Paradise, their combined weight preventing the film from becoming the hard-hitting moral drama it clearly wants to be.
Credits
- Producers
- Alain Bernheim
- Steve Golin
- Screenplay
- Wesley Strick
- Bruce Robinson
- Director of Photography
- Reynaldo Villalobos
- Editors
- Andrew Mondshein
- Craig McKay
- Production Designer
- Bill Groom
- Music
- Mark Mancina
- ©PolyGram Filmed Entertainment, Inc
- ©Propaganda Films
- Production Companies
- ©Propaganda Films
- PolyGram Filmed Entertainment presents
- a Propaganda Films production in association with Tetragram
- Executive Producers
- David Arnold
- Ezra Swerdlow
- Executive in Charge of Production
- Tim Clawson
- Production Supervisors
- Joel Hatch
- Asia Crew:
- Scott Koenig
- Hong Kong:
- Allen Wan
- Production Co-ordinators
- Deirdre M. Cook
- Hong Kong:
- Venus Cheuk
- Thailand:
- Suvimon Ptcharayuporn
- Production Managers
- Hong Kong:
- Chu Chung-On
- Thailand:
- Penny Kanjanapinchote
- Unit Production Manager
- Ezra Swerdlow
- Hong Kong Unit Manager
- Thomas Leung
- Location Managers
- Evelyn Pinezich
- Hong Kong:
- Peter Chu
- Thailand:
- Thhongterd Mahasuwan
- Post Supervisor
- Propaganda Films:
- Glenn Kiser
- Post-production Supervisor
- Linda Rae Shamest
- Assistant Directors
- Michael E. Steele
- Julie A. Bloom
- Louis Guerra
- Hong Kong:
- O.J. Tang
- Thailand:
- Apichart Chusakul
- Tippawan Mamance
- Script Supervisor
- Corey Yugler
- Casting
- Associate:
- Eric R. Zuckerman
- Additional Voice:
- David Kramer
- Hong Kong Co-ordinator:
- Chris Chan
- Camera Operators
- David T. Knox
- Bruce MacCallum
- Hong Kong:
- Stanley Hung
- Digital Matte Paintings
- Matte World Digital
- Visual Effects Supervisor:
- Craig Barron
- Visual Effects Producer:
- Krystyna Demkowicz
- Chief Digital Matte Artist:
- Chris Evans
- Digital Composite Supervisor:
- Paul Rivera
- Effects Photography:
- Patrick Loungway
- Effects Editorial:
- Ken Rogerson
- Special Effects Co-ordinator
- Steve Kirshoff
- Sign Artist
- Thailand:
- Kriskorn Pasutanavin
- Thailand Letterer
- Paisal Ariyasophon
- Art Directors
- Dennis Bradford
- Hong Kong:
- Rosa Pang
- Thailand:
- Arin Pinijorarat
- Set Decorators
- Betsy Klompus
- Hong Kong:
- Ken Chiu
- Thailand:
- Cholwika Koomkaew
- Storyboard Artist
- Karl Shefelman
- Costume Designer
- Juliet Polcsa
- Wardrobe Supervisors
- Elizabeth Feldbauer
- Elizabeth Gulczynski
- Hong Kong:
- Alice Lee
- Trachai Prisana
- Thailand:
- Prisana Traichai
- Key Make-up Artist
- Katherine Bihr
- Key Hairstylist
- Francesca Paris
- Title Design
- Balsmeyer & Everett, Inc
- Titles/Opticals
- Cineric Inc
- Musicians
- Solo Flute/Ethnic Woodwinds:
- Fred Selden
- French Horn Soloist:
- Ron Applegate
- Oboe/English Horn Soloist:
- Jon Clarke
- Orchestrations
- David Metzger
- Mark Mancina
- Music Supervisor
- Frankie Pine
- Score Producer
- Christopher Ward
- Music Production Co-ordinator
- Robb Boyd
- Music Editor
- Thomas Drescher
- Music Recording Engineer
- Joseph Magee
- Soundtrack
- "Jing Jing (Firefly)" by Shoukichi Kina, Tito Kawachi, performed by Shoukichi Kina; "Beautiful Lady" by Ken Woon Liew, performed by Equal; "The Courtship" by Benny Carter, performed by Kenny Barron, Ray Drummond, Ben Riley; "Sonata in F Minor" by Domenico Scarlatti; "Midnight on Sunset" by/performed by Alan Mirikitani
- Sound Mixer
- William Sarokin
- Re-recording Mixer
- Reilly Steele
- Additional Re-recording
- Dominick Tavella
- Supervising Sound Editor
- Stan Bochner
- Dialogue Editors
- Kevin Lee
- Branka Mrkic
- Sound Effects Editor
- Richard Q. King
- ADR
- New York Recordist:
- Bobby Johanson
- New York Mixer:
- David Boulton
- Los Angeles Mixer:
- Jackson Schwartz
- Editor:
- Jane McCulley
- Foley
- Artists:
- Brian Vancho
- Ryan Collison
- Mixer:
- George Lara
- Editor:
- Pam DeMetruis
- Stunt Co-ordinators
- Jack Gill
- Peter Bucossi
- Cast
- Vince Vaughn
- Sheriff
- Anne Heche
- Beth
- Joaquin Phoenix
- Lewis
- David Conrad
- Tony
- Jada Pinkett Smith
- M.J. Major
- Vera Farmiga
- Kerrie
- Nick Sandow
- Ravitch
- Ming Lee
- Mr Chandran
- Joel De La Fuente
- Mr Doramin
- Richard Chang
- prosecutor
- James Michael McCauley
- famous divorce lawyer
- Brettanya Friese
- young woman in limo
- Deanna Yusoff
- woman in bar
- David Zayas
- construction foreman
- Amy Wong
- ticket agent
Is Issariya- Malaysian woman in hammock
- Ed Hodson
- features editor
- Kevin Scullin
- Glenn Patrick
- doormen
- Yusmal Ghazali
- Aril Izani
- Kwak Wai
- scruffy guys
- Curzon Dobell
- client
- Vincent Patrick
- tavern waiter
- Elizabeth Rodriguez
- Gaby
- Teoh Kah Yong
- Chief Justice
- Rebecca Saifer
- hotel waitress
- Rebecca Boyd
- restaurant hostess
- Woon-Kin Chin
- guard
- Regina Wu
- bailiff
- Greg Baglia
- Claudia Besso
- Blanca Camacho
- Gilbert Cruz
- Patricia R. Floyd
- David Kramer
- Robert Lunney
- Rae C. Wright
- Richard Chang
- Fatimah Hashim
- Adriene Hashimi
- Ikmail Ismail
- David Lee
- Chan Lim
- Haris Mohomed
- Mary O'Shaughnessy
- Nurul Huda Rahim
- Dolly Unithan
- Simpson Wong
- additional voices
- Certificate
- 15
- Distributor
- PolyGram Filmed Entertainment
- 10,041 feet
- 111 minutes 34 seconds
- Dolby digital
- In Colour