Ticket To Paradise (2022) On the surface, anyway, it plays out like a studied, labored attempt to replicate a 90's rom-com.....
But with its heavy reliance on ugly, mean-spirited behavior from its principal leads, you know right away this could only come out of our current toxic social climate.
One big plus for travel agencies......if nothing else, the movie's a gorgeous travelogue for Queensland, Australia, doubling for what's supposed to be the the island of Bali. Well, the hell with Bali, book me for Down Under.....
One big minus for the rest of us......the movie itself.
I get it. We're all supposed to drool and salivate at the idea of George Clooney and Julia Roberts reunited to strike some comedic sparks. Cue the big giggles! Cue the romantic fireworks!
Funny thing about comedic sparks and romantic fireworks......to set some off,, you need an actual comedic script, which this movie painfully lacks.
In place of genuine funny stuff (or to imitate said stuff), the film makes the powerhouse duo play long divorced parents of a daughter (Kaitlyn Dever) newly graduated from law school. They may adore their kid, but they've spent half a lifetime engaging in exhaustive, rapid fire bickering......amusing to listen to for about maybe 15 seconds tops, but the film proceeds to pound us on the head with the verbal jousts until we beg for mercy.......
Off a Bali vacation goes Dever, where she falls head over heels for a native seaweed farmer (Maxime Bouttier) a sweet, gentle, copper-colored creamsicle of a dreamboat. Screw her future as lawyer, they make plans to marry......outraging George and Julia at the idea of their daughter tossing away a future she's worked so hard for.
The impending Balinese nuptials force the perpetually sniping couple into not only a cease fire, but forced proximity and a common goal......to thwart the wedding, bring their kid back to her senses and spirit her far away from Bali and the seaweed dreamboat.
To accomplish all this, they start out with passive-aggressive reverse psychology, but soon resort to cruel pranks, like stealing ceremonial rings to stop one of Dever and Dreamboat's pre-wedding rituals.....and do I even need mention that none of this is even the least bit comedic?
This general air of sourness drags on until it's time for the movie, in a last desperate ploy for laughs, to trot out the standard slapstick gags of romcoms set in exotic locations. So George faces a 'Jaws'-like encounter with a dolphin and Julia has to suck snake poison out of the bitten leg of her much younger, airline pilot boy-toy...(another useless addition to the character list)
Unfunny to the max, "Ticket To Paradise" veers from these gasping attempts at humor to tedious, falsely emotional 'heart to hearts' between the cast.......it's all so mechanical and boilerplate rom-com, there isn't a minute of real human feeling or any moment that rings true.
But oh that wonderful lush sun drenched Australian scenery......for that alone, 1 star (*). For the rest? Meh......dig out your old Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan DVDs instead.....
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