Ticket to Paradise: Film Review
I had high hopes for Ticket to Paradise because I feel like blockbuster romantic comedies don’t get made anymore, especially ones with big-name stars like Julia Roberts and George Clooney. It isn’t perfect but I still enjoyed it immensely.
Clooney and Roberts play David and Georgia Cotton, exes who hate each other so much that they can’t even be in the same room. However, they have to push their resentments aside and work together when they discover that their daughter Lily (Kaitlyn Dever) has become engaged to seaweed farmer Gede (Maxime Bouttier) only a few weeks into her post-university trip to Bali. Naturally, they head over to Bali to try and stop the wedding.
Ticket to Paradise isn’t the resounding success I hoped it would be but I still had a great time watching it. It brought me so much joy watching Clooney and Roberts reunited onscreen – they are natural megawatt stars who are utterly charming on their own and are absolutely terrific together. Their chemistry is magnetic and I could have watched them trade barbs and joke around all day. This pairing is what makes the movie as good as it is.
The script isn’t the strongest and the story is quite predictable (what romcom isn’t?) but it’s all about the ride and I thought Ticket to Paradise was very entertaining. It’s not trying to be anything more than a light-hearted escape and it certainly achieves that – it’s so much fun, it’s beautiful to look at, and some of the setpieces cracked me up. The beer pong scene is incredible and one of the most entertaining sequences I’ve seen this year.
The Roberts and Clooney reunion is the big sell for this movie and it doesn’t disappoint – they seem to be having a blast and it’s amazing to witness. But they aren’t the only ones worth shouting about – Billie Lourd as Lily’s best friend Wren is hilarious. She is basically the same character she played in Booksmart but she does it so well! Lucas Bravo plays the serious Gabriel in Emily in Paris so it was fun to see him flex his comedy muscles as Georgia’s lovestruck boyfriend Paul.
Ticket to Paradise doesn’t quite reach the heights I wanted but I didn’t come away feeling too disappointed because it still cheered me up and put a big smile on my face.
In cinemas now