Paradise
By VARIETY STAFF

The peripatetic life of filmmaker Michael Almereyda ("Happy Here and Now,"
"Hamlet") is captured in glorious fragments forming a breathtaking whole in
his new video feature, "Paradise." While impatient viewers might perceive the
chain of 33 scenes (lensed in nearly as many locales) as randomly shot bits, a
closer examination reveals a superb panorama of contemporary life and death,
from the simple pleasures of mornings at home with children to the grief of
a funeral. Though Almereyda says this is a work in progress, current version
qualifies for status at high-end, art-oriented fests and will make a lovely
DVD special.

Training his low-end camera on whatever interesting sights and sounds he has
encountered in his many wide-ranging travels, Almereyda displays a keen
interest in details, whether it's the way Los Angeles' giant metropolitan gleam
dwarfs Fourth of July fireworks (seen in night vision), or the way a little
boy accidentally falls into a pool in Esfahan, Iran.

Many scenes are dominated by children, or adults engrossed in childlike
wonderment (as when a woman captures a firefly), along with scenes involving
fire
and creative invention (from experiments at Caltech to Sonic Youth in
concert).

As the film's bookended shots of airport corridors suggest, "Paradise" is
meticulously constructed underneath its seemingly random facade. The sight of a
police car on a Los Angeles street, linked (by editors Laurie Butler, Bara
K. Jihova and Rachel Webster) with a Gotham flag procession, elegantly flows
into a wistful observation of the post-massacre memorial at Virginia Tech and
a private funeral.

Even more private is the sight of the rarely seen Terrence Malick directing
Colin Farrell on the set of "The New World."

With: Colin Farrell, Terrence Malick, Sonic Youth, Elina Lowensohn.
(English, Farsi dialogue)

Camera (color, DV), Almereyda; editors, Laurie Butler, Bara K. Jichova,
Rachel Webster; music, Paul D. Miller.

Reviewed on DVD, Los Angeles, Oct. 30, 2008.
(In AFI Los Angeles Film Festival -- ALT_Cinema.)
Running time: 75 MIN.

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