Paradise Now details
| Format: | 15 DVD |
|---|---|
| Starring: | Kais Nashef, Ali Suliman, Lubna Azabal, Amer Hlehel, Hiam Abbass |
| Director: | Hany Abu-Assad |
| Genres: | Drama - General, World Cinema - Chinese |
| Studio: | WARNER HOME VIDEO |
| Name | Discs | |
|---|---|---|
Paradise Now |
15 Feature |
DVD Information
| Run time: | 1 hour 28 minutes |
|---|---|
| Rental release: | 14 Aug 2006 |
| Main languages: | Arabic |
| Subtitles: | English |
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LOVEFiLM Review
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By Tom Charity from LOVEFiLMParadise Now is Robert Stone's flashy documentary about two childhood friends who are recruited for a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv.
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Most helpful review
Paradise Now
By SAI81 (360 reviews) from Tonbridge , 03 May 2006[Highly rated reviewer]
am sure some people will take one look at the coverage of Paradise Now and vow not to see it. It's a Palestinian film about 24 hours in the life of two young childhood friends who are chosen for a 'martyrdom mission' in Israel. Given this there will be people who leap to the conclusion that it must be sympathetic to suicide bombers, or endorsing what they do. These people are wrong.
Paradise Now is a sober, serious film which takes a long hard look at people we usualy just arbitraily brand as monsters. The first 20 minutes of the film lets us get to know Khaled (Ali Suliman) and Said (Kais Nashef) we spend an afternoon with them; two young men much like any others and we get to like them which makes what follows all the more shocking. While the film refuses, to its credit, to demonise Khaled and Said it absolutely doesn't endorse what they plan to do and shows the terrorist network around them as fundamentally evil and dishonest.
The film is often chilling; witness Khaled's video statement about his actions, flawlessly played by Suliman, but doesn't forget that the grimness of it's subject needs some leavening and at the most tense moments a brief second of comedy is granted to you, almost as a way of letting you relax.
Leads Suliman and Nashef are spectacular and surrounded by an able supporting cast, notably Lubna Azabal as a young teacher who is falling for Said and Amer Hlehel as Jamal, one of the minders assigned to Said and Khaled and the film's true villain.
Debut director Hany Abu Assad doesn't use many filmmaking tricks, much of the film has the look of a documentary and that ring of truth extends to everything in the film. It's impossible to know how close Assad gets to the truth but this feels all too real.
So why not a top grade? Well I guessed the ending. Not that unusual but I guessed almost every detail by the middle of the film (and by the start of the last scene I'd even guessed exactly what the final shot would be). This predictability does make Paradise Now a slightly lesser film than it might otherwise have been but it is still pretty extraordinary and very highly recommended.- Was this review helpful to you?
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All reviews
(49)REALLY BORING!!!!
By a customer , 21 Dec 2012Boring beyond words just talk, talk, talk nothing happening more talking nothing happening yawn and eventually ejected the DVD after the longest 30 minutes of my life- Was this review helpful to you?
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Not quite paradise but a very good film.
By gingerspike (410 reviews) from Grimsby , 15 Dec 2012A film about two Palestinian friends who are given only 24 hours notice that they are to carry out a suicide bombing. The film handles the harrowing subject matter well and has both heart and humour. An intelligent film, well worth watching.- Was this review helpful to you?
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Intelligence now!
By Oldbloke (307 reviews) from Sidmouth , 10 Oct 2011Two Palestinian friends are given just 24 hours notice that they have been chosen to carry out a suicide bombing. To most people in the west, their actions are evil, stupid and pointless, so why do it? Here at last, we have a film that attempts to answer that question. The Director steers clear of the anger and hysteria that we see on the new bulletins and gives us a story about two intelligent humorous young men, who wrestle with their consciences and come to different conclusions. There are no apologies or condemnation and you don't have to be pro Palestinian or pro Israeli to enjoy this thoughtful, important and thoughly enjoyable film- Was this review helpful to you?
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Restrained and intelligent
By a customer from Isle of Skye, Scotland , 16 Aug 2011From its ironic title until the credits roll less than 90 minutes later, this film is taut, disciplined, restrained and intelligent, leaving you the viewer plenty of opportunity to form your own reactions and thoughts.
It would be oh so easy for a film on this subject to slip into polemic, to over-emphasise a point just in case we don't get it, or to overload with too many issues. Instead we get a glimpse - just a glimpse - of the lives of the kind of young Palestinian men who get selected to blow themselves and Israelis up. That glimpse has left me with far more to think about than any newspaper article (if I bothered to read them) or TV news report I've seen.
This director has real self-control.- Was this review helpful to you?
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Very interesting
By powererin (30 reviews) from London , 22 May 2011A very sensitive set of issues, but nevertheless it is deeply personal and an insight into how sometimes the smallest things can occur in lives that possible send people down a road they haven't really consciously decided upon. History has a lot to answer for, and memories are long. It doesn't martyr the characters, but simply tries to dramatise a set of events from a tough area of the world that lead up to some very difficult decisions for these characters to make.- Was this review helpful to you?
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