Paradise Found (2003)

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Best movie ever!

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

The Post-Impressionist painter Paul Gauguin was famously portrayed by Anthony Quinn in the Van Gogh biopic "Lust for Life" in the fifties, a performance which won Quinn a "Best Supporting Actor" Oscar, even though his character is only on stage for eight minutes. In "Paradise Found" it is Gauguin's turn to take centre stage. This is not a complete biography of the painter- Van Gogh, for example, is never mentioned- but concentrates on two periods in his life. In 1880 Gaugin is working as a stockbroker in Paris. His job pays well and he has become a fully paid-up member of the French haute bourgeoisie. He is also an amateur painter and an enthusiastic art collector. A chance meeting with the older artist Camille Pissarro, who later becomes a close friend, persuades him that his vocation is to paint full-time and he resigns from his job, much to the dismay of his Danish-born wife Mette. Intercut with the scenes showing the beginning of Gauguin's artistic career are others set during a later part of his life. He is now separated from Mette and his family and living in Tahiti where he has gone to seek inspiration. He befriends the local inhabitants, whose way of life he admires, and clashes with the local missionaries and the French colonial authorities who he believes are threatening to destroy traditional Tahitian culture in their zeal to bring Christianity to the island. The film's title, an obvious play on that of Milton's "Paradise Lost", therefore has an ironic meaning. Gauguin believes that he has found Paradise in Tahiti, but it is a Paradise in danger of being "lost" again, and that danger, ironically, comes from the Christian religion of which Milton was so ardent an advocate. Gauguin is played by Kiefer Sutherland whose father, Donald, also once played the artist, in the 1986 film "The Wolf at the Door", which I must admit I have never seen. Now there is nothing really wrong with Kiefer's performance here, but it does not really catch fire. The best of the cast is probably Alun Armstrong as Pissarro. Nastassja Kinski never really looks convincing as Mette, largely because of that blonde wig. (Someone obviously told the director, incorrectly, that there are no brunettes in Denmark). It is not impossible to make a bad film about the life of a great artist- Derek Jarman managed it with the near-incomprehensible "Caravaggio"- but because so many famous have been passionate, larger-than-life individuals, films about them give great scope for film-makers and actors to produce something memorable. I am thinking not only of Quinn and Kirk Douglas in "Lust for Life" but also of Charles Laughton in "Rembrandt", Charlton Heston as Michelangelo in "The Agony and the Ecstasy", Colin Firth as Vermeer in "The Girl with a Pearl Earring" and Timothy Spall in Mike Leigh's recent "Mr Turner". "Paradise Found" is visually attractive, both in those scenes set in France and those taking place in the South Pacific, and overall it is not a bad film. In fact, it is quite a good one. I just felt that a film dealing with someone like Gauguin could have done better than "quite good". 7/10

My son Ruben Kraaijeveld worked on this movie for 4 weeks while we lived in Prague, acting as one of Gaugain's sons. I see all the other kids named in the crew listing: Jan, Emil and Pauline, but his name is missing. That's a real shame, since he worked hard for it and was only 9 (!) at the time. Movie itself I can't rate, we've been trying for years to get a copy but to no avail. Now I am going to look even harder, there must be a way to see my own kid play!!! He's been in a movie before, an Italian one that only showed in Italy and we also couldn't see. So I'd like to get info on both movies, Paradise Found and "The inverse canon" or "Canone Inverso", which was the Italian title of the movie. Anyone out there that can help maybe??? Thanks!

This film, as far as I can remember, never had a commercial run here, or at least, this movie probably went to cable right after it's release in other countries. The idea of watching a biopic about Gauguin intrigued me since this painter had a turbulent career and his paintings, especially his Tahitian ones, revolutionized the art world.As it has been pointed out by other contributors to this forum, Paul Gauguin had a difficult life. He was never clearly understood by his wife, or the general public he tried to conquer. He was a passionate man who left all the comforts in order to pursue an ambition that never gave him the happiness or economic security that others attained.The screen play, not being linear, doesn't add much to the story. We are constantly taken back and forth, knowing little about the man. Paul Gauguin's family life was an unhappy one. His wife Mette never clearly understood him, nor stuck by him when he abandoned the brokerage house. Mette appears as a cold woman who never shared her husband's passion for the life he embarked.Kiefer Sutherland's interpretation of the painter can go so far; he is hindered by an uninspired screen play. As far as his struggle with the local priest, who clearly wants to take the natives' culture away from them, is only a distraction. Actually, we see very little about the passion that consumed Gauguin during his time in Tahiti as he spends very little time doing what he went there for, in the first place: painting!

Being the die hard Sutherland fan that I am, I enjoyed this flick purely for his performance. The film is rather superficial and slow-moving, but there is quite a bit of power behind Sutherland's performance, which makes it worth the while of those who just need more of Kiefer. I can't say I'd watch this film again, but I appreciate the emotional investment that the actors put into it. A six out of ten.