Movies - Paradise Now

Home > Listing Index > Movies > Paradise Now

	Movies - Paradise Now

Paradise Now is a controversial but widely acclaimed 2005 film directed by Hany Abu-Assad about two Palestinian men preparing for a suicide attack in Israel. It won a Golden Globe for best foreign language film and was nominated for an Academy Award in the same category.

Tagline: From the most unexpected place, comes a bold new call for peace.

Plot

Paradise Now follows two Palestinian childhood friends who have been recruited for a strike on Tel Aviv and focuses on their last days together. When they are intercepted at the Israeli border and separated from their handlers, a young woman who discovers their plan causes them to reconsider their actions.

Main cast

Kais Nashef — Said
Ali Suliman — Khaled
Lubna Azabal — Suha
Amer Hlehel — Jamal
Hiam Abbass
— Said's mother

Awards

Academy Award

On January 31, 2006, the film was nominated in the Best Foreign Language Film category.

Golden Globe

Paradise Now won "Best Foreign Language Film" for the 63rd Golden Globe Awards, the first time a Palestinian film was nominated for such an award.

Other awards won

2005 Berlin International Film Festival:
* Amnesty International Film Prize
* AGICOA 2005 Blue Angel Award
* Reader Jury of the "Berliner Morgenpost"
2005 European Film Awards:
* Best Screenplay
2005 Independent Spirit Awards:
* Best Foreign Film
2005 National Board of Review Awards (USA) :
*Best Foreign Language Film
2005 Golden Calf
(Netherland's Film Festival):
* Best Feature Film (Beste Lange Speelfilm)
* Best Editing (Beste Montage)
2005 Durban International Film Festival (South Africa)
* Best Director
2005 Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Awards
* Best Foreign Language Film
2005 Vancouver Film Critics Circle Awards
* Best Foreign Film

Reviews

Variety: "Handsomely shot in widescreen, mostly on actual West Bank locations, and well-played by the cast, pic lays out the issues in an accessible but rather too over-correct way, seemingly eager to please all parties at the expense of real passion."
Entertainment Weekly: "Shooting with energy and a great sense of storytelling, Abu-Assad gambles, astutely, that disappointing those who demand complete condemnation — or support —is a risk worth taking if it furthers the causes of peace and justice, not to mention exciting filmmaking."
The New York Times: "'Paradise Now' sustains a mood of breathless suspense. Politics aside, the movie is a superior thriller whose shrewdly inserted plot twists and emotional wrinkles are calculated to put your heart in your throat and keep it there."
New York Post: "Too bitterly real to be a comedy, but its irony is a useful tool for needling terrorists from the inside."
Rolling Stone: "What does amaze is the humane and nonpartisan treatment of the topic by Palestinian director and co-writer Hany Abu-Assad. By detailing two days in the lives of these young mechanics — they've been friends since childhood — as they prepare to sacrifice their future for a cause they barely understand, the director puts a human face on the headlines."
National Public Radio: "Paradise Now is a powerful and provocative drama about the nightmare of terrorism. It gets its strength from its dispassion. It is uncompromising in its determination to explain, rather than justify, incomprehensible acts...You may think you'll be seeing Paradise Now for its relevance, but its life-and-death drama is what will keep you transfixed."
Los Angeles Times:"..A powerful, poignant, provocative drama, it gets its strength from its dispassion, from an uncompromising determination to explain rather than justify or condemn, to put a human face on incomprehensible acts."
Hollywood Reporter:"Abu-Assad keeps the portrait of the militants balanced and nuanced. No one is presented as a villain or crazed individual. This may not be the way some would like to see Islamic extremists portrayed, but they are all the more frightening for their ordinariness."
San Francisco Chronicle:"The film captures the bleakness of the West Bank and, more powerfully, shows us lives so grim that the thought of paradise now seems enticing."
Arizona Daily Star: "Hany Abu-Assad, a Palestinian born in Israel, sketches his tale with insight and vigor, daringly poking at both sides of the conflict that has burdened his life since birth."
Arizona Republic:"A risk-taking but enlightening film that takes the novel approach of examining the Israeli-Arab impasse from the perspective of the Palestinians."
Chicago Tribune: "catches and keeps your attention because of its daring subject, real-life backdrops and the intensity of its actors."
Chicago Sun-Times :"Certainly what Said says will not come as a surprise to any Israeli. It's simply that they disagree.We may disagree, too, and yet watch the film with a fearsome fascination."
The Boston Globe: "Paradise Now' fall into place too easily. In presenting characters who make arguments for and against participating in a bombing, the movie feels curiously equivocal. It's too simply reasoned and too tidily made to shake you up. "
Philadelphia Inquirer : "With a documentarian's eye and a dramatist's urgency, Abu-Assad sneaks into the mind of a suicide bomber, and also his heart."
Christian Science Monitor:"He attempts with mixed results to get inside the psyches of men who would blow themselves up for the cause."
The Seattle Times:"Visually arresting (the widescreen format quickly becomes indispensable) and consistently well-acted (especially by the intense Nashef), "Paradise Now" is not without its humorous touches."
The Miami Herald: "It would be difficult to undertake a more politically relevant film or explore a more volatile subject, and Abu-Assad attempts his project with skill and sensitivity."
The Washington Post:"Paradise" may not change anyone's ideology, but it should convince some that, but for some deeply divisive views of religious morality, people are pretty much the same on either side of the holy fence."
The Salt Lake Tribune:"What is striking about "Paradise Now" is the stark way Abu-Assad lays out the situation, unvarnished and unbiased."
Empire: "To say it's a delicate subject would be almost insultingly understating the case, and although it doesn't all work, Abu-Assad handles the story with appropriate care, giving the audience plenty to mull over."
Sydney Morning Herald: "The film is made in a quiet and sober observational style, a bit like an Iranian film. The pace quickens as the men suit up with their deadly cargo but, again, the director surprises with his story."

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Paradise Now ]

This page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article Paradise Now; it is used under the GNU Free Documentation License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the GFDL.

Searches on eBay