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Return to Paradise (1998)

tomatometer

71

Average Rating: 6.6/10
Reviews Counted: 45
Fresh: 32 | Rotten: 13

No consensus yet.

75

Average Rating: 6.9/10
Critic Reviews: 12
Fresh: 9 | Rotten: 3

No consensus yet.

audience

74

liked it
Average Rating: 3.5/5
User Ratings: 7,520

My Rating

Movie Info

This remake of Force Majeure (aka Uncontrollable Circumstances), a 1989 film with Alan Bates and Kristin Scott Thomas, recalls the prison plight depicted in Midnight Express (1978). Rambling around Asia, getting high and just having a good time, are three young men -- Sheriff (Vince Vaughn), Lewis (Joaquin Phoenix), and Tony (David Conrad). Sheriff and Tony say goodbye to Lewis, a conscientious Greenpeace activist and nature-lover who stays on to rescue endangered Borneo orangutans. Two years

R, 1 hr. 52 min.

Mystery & Suspense, Drama

Wesley Strick, Bruce Robinson

Jan 11, 2000

PolyGram Video

Cast

All Critics (46) | Top Critics (12) | Fresh (32) | Rotten (13) | DVD (5)

What if director Joseph Ruben didn't resort to B-movie suspense tricks? What if the fine cast wasn't saddled with a shamelessly contrived script by Wesley Strick and Bruce Robinson?

May 11, 2001 Comment
Rolling Stone
Top Critic IconTop Critic

If it's to be experienced at all, Return to Paradise is best seen as a lively piece of pulp, not a profound exploration of the vagaries of the human soul.

February 14, 2001 Full Review Source: Los Angeles Times | Comment
Los Angeles Times
Top Critic IconTop Critic

The real discovery ... is Vince Vaughn, who didn't make as much of a splash in Jurassic Park: The Lost World as he was expected to. Now he does.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: San Francisco Chronicle | Comment
San Francisco Chronicle
Top Critic IconTop Critic

This is a major example of a good idea, one that could have worked, being submitted to a Hollywood tag-team makeover.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: CNN.com | Comment
CNN.com
Top Critic IconTop Critic

The best performance in the film belongs to Anne Heche, who continues to impress with her range. Her work here is passionate, and she effectively conveys the inner conflict of a woman whose divided loyalties tear at her soul.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: ReelViews | Comment
ReelViews
Top Critic IconTop Critic

Like Sheriff and Tony, we're pulled both ways by the story: We want them to go back and save Lewis, but we're not exactly sure we'd do the same. That's the Prisoner's Dilemma in a nutshell.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | Comment
Chicago Sun-Times
Top Critic IconTop Critic

Despite solid performances from the leads, it comes shrouded in a heavy cloud of ethics-class complications that makes it feel like a "dilemma of the week" TV movie.

October 4, 2009 Full Review Source: TV Guide's Movie Guide | Comment
TV Guide's Movie Guide

It's a painful prospect, to be sure, and Sheriff, in particular, insists he's no hero, but the next hour or so of handwringing conjures little suspense.

June 24, 2006 Full Review Source: Time Out | Comment

Vince Vaughn finally gives a performance putting him in the serious actor category, Joaquin Phoenix is notable and Anne Heche is believable as the impassioned attorney fighting for the life of her client.

December 6, 2005 Full Review Source: Film Threat | Comment (1)
Film Threat

Involving drama about our responsibilities to others.

January 24, 2005 Full Review Source: Classic Film and Television | Comment
Classic Film and Television

The acting is generally good -- Vaughn is very convincing as a man forced to make a difficult decision, while Joaquin Phoenix even more convincingly plays a man condemned to die.

July 28, 2004 Full Review | Comment
rec.arts.movies.reviews

Return to Paradise is precisely the kind of film I tend to like; one which could go many ways, and one which, if done right, could have a true and profound moral. And it didn't dissapoint.

May 22, 2003 Full Review Source: Film Blather | Comment
Film Blather

Fine, low-key performances by Ann Heche as the attorney and Vince Vaughn and David Conrad as the two men she must persuade help sustain our interest in the characters. But after the wrong turn, the story feels as forced as it once was exciting.

May 20, 2003 Comment
Palo Alto Weekly

As disturbing as it is excellent.

February 8, 2003 Full Review Source: Film Quips Online | Comment
Film Quips Online

Truly Unforgettable. A tour-de-force for Phoenix.

September 18, 2002 Comment
Moviehole

The whole thing is quite thought provoking, and it's well written even though there are some flaws in the script.

September 10, 2002 Full Review Source: Montreal Film Journal | Comment
Montreal Film Journal

Vaughn labors mightily under the obviousness of the script, while managing to reveal a fragile but profound fear of being an aging frat boy who longs to realize a finer, better self, only to be petrified that quality isn't within him.

June 5, 2002 Full Review Source: Boxoffice Magazine | Comment
Boxoffice Magazine

What one ambitious person does in New York City affects the deliberations of a judge in Malaysia.

March 2, 2002 Full Review Source: Spirituality and Practice | Comment
Spirituality and Practice

A quiet, thoughtful movie about hard moral choices, truth, love, accountability, crime, punishment and friendship.

January 1, 2001 Full Review Source: Laramie Movie Scope | Comment
Laramie Movie Scope

Phoenix, who was memorable in To Die For, is unearthly here as a man reduced to a wraith by miserable prison conditions and hopelessness. As an actor, he seems to have abandoned his body entirely in order to communicate only through his spirit.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: San Francisco Examiner | Comment
San Francisco Examiner
More Critic Reviews

Audience Reviews for Return to Paradise

An original, thought-provoking film concerning three friends who party hard in Malaysia one summer (Vince Vaughn, Joaquin Phoenix, and David Conrad), where illegal substances are used frequently and the concentration is on just "having a good time". Flash forward a few years later, two of the buds (Vaughn and Conrad)

November 10, 2011
Dan Schultz

Super Reviewer

The intricate workings of the moral dilemma somehow overcome the melodrama. You could complain that the concept deserved to no give-ins to schmaltz from the directors, actors and the soundtrack... but including the schmaltz makes this movie a twisted, tragic version of The Hangover.

October 25, 2010
adammahler1

Super Reviewer

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