Paradise: Hope/Paradies: Hoffnung (2013) - A chubby teen camp meets the Seidl eye

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Three large young women sit awkwardly on a gym bench on this poster for Ulrich Seidl's Paradise: Hope

Melanie is an overweight teenage girl who is sent away to a camp for girls like herself for a time to alter her lifestyle.

Paradise: Hope is written by Veronika Franz (Kern (2012, documentary)) and great Austrian filmmaker, co-writer/director Ulrich Seidl (Models (1999)). It is the 3rd film in the pair's Paradise trilogy, also consisting of Paradise: Love (2012) and Paradise: Faith (2012). The title is a literal translation of the original German title.

We follow Melanie's camp stay, which Seidl investigates without much of a direction with the added label 'Hope', which also doesn't seem to say much about the characters here. They are young; yes, hopeful; perhaps. - But we never learn where they end up. There are still fine and unusual scenes in Paradise: Hope, but it is the weakest in the trilogy and fundamentally it is missing something.

 

Related post:

 

Ulrich Seidl: Paradise: Faith/Paradies: Glaube (2012) - Strong Catholic faith through Seidl's lens 

Paradise: Love/Paradies: Liebe (2012) - Woman's love safari fertile ground for Seidl drama

 

 

Watch a teaser for the film here

 

Cost: Unknown

Box office: 457k $

= Uncertain but likely a mega-flop (projected return of 0.25 times its cost)

[Paradise: Hope premiered 8 February (Berlin International Film Festival) and runs 100 minutes. Shooting took place in Austria. The film opened #75 to a 2k $ first weekend in 1 theater in North America, spreading to 3 theaters but unable to gain a higher rank, grossing 6k $ (1.3 % of the total gross). The film's 3 biggest markets were Germany with 189k $ (41.4 %), Austria with 168k $ (36.8 %) and Spain with 44k $ (9.6 %). If made on a realistic 1.8 mil. $ budget, the film would rank as a mega-flop. Seidl returned with In the Basement/Im Keller (2014, documentary). Melanie Lenz (Paradise: Love (2012)), who plays Melanie, did not return to the screen after the film. Paradise: Hope is fresh at 88 % with a 7.10/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Paradise: Hope?