Ticket to Paradise review: A surprising delight
Review Overview
Cast
8Script
6Ivan Radford | On 07, May 2023
Director: Ol Parker
Cast: George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Kaitlyn Dever, Maxime Bouttier
Certificate: 12
Where have all the movie stars gone? While crowd-pulling stars who guarantee a box office smash can seem like a thing of yesteryear, Ticket to Paradise is a winning reminder that – box office hit or not – movie star charisma still can bring a certain magic to the big screen.
George Clooney and Julia Roberts team up for the fifth time to play David and Georgia, young sweethearts who raced into marriage years ago and wound up awkwardly, non-amicably divorced. So when their daughter, Lily (Kaitlyn Dever), invites them to Bali for a getaway, they’re not pleased to find each other in attendance – but when they realise that she’s planning a quick wedding with Balinese dude Gede (Maxime Bouttier), they reluctantly work together to stop her making a rash mistake.
A-listers enjoying a sunny holiday is an age-old cinema tradition, but there’s a real sense of Clooney and Roberts having a ball as the bitter exes. Their chemistry crackles the more they bicker, whether it’s outdoing each other at Lily’s graduation or verbally sniping at each other on a plane. That means that it’s all the more rewarding when they do start to get along – particularly during an amusingly uninhibited beer pong session. They also bring an unexpected depth to their exploration of a relationship turned sour, turning what could have been a superficial rom-com into a poignant intergenerational exploration of romance, expectation and communication.
That’s all the more impressive given some of the formulaic beats in the script – co-written by Daniel Pipski and director Ol Parker. But Parker ensures that the leading couple’s warmth is catching, with Dever and Bouttier playing things suitably earnest and Billie Lourd (Dever’s Booksmart co-star) milking her best friend role for every possible drop of comic relief.
The result is a familiar sun-and-sea jaunt, but one that’s elevated by a cast with a winning blend of wit and experience – a reminder of just how delightful star power can be.