Common Sense Media Review
By Barbara Shulgasser-Parker
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Squatter with grudge menaces; cursing, violence, sex.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 16+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Watch
Videos and Photos
Paradise Cove
What's the Story?
In PARADISE COVE, Knox (Todd Grinnell) and his wife, Tracey (Mena Suvari), have been flipping homes in Michigan. The action begins as they arrive in Malibu, California, a wealthy beach community near Los Angeles, where his sketchy mother managed to acquire a beach house. She died in a fire there, and the goal is to rehab the smoky remains, flip it, and live happily ever after on the millions in profit. Standing in their way is Bree (Kristen Bauer van Straten), the attractive, angry, and unstable former owner of the house who now lives under it in the sand. Bree was an actress/model, or so her portfolio suggests, and was married to a successful movie producer until divorce led to her losing child custody. She rented the house to Knox's batty mom, who paid the taxes and wrangled ownership of the place out from under Bree's nose. To say that Bree holds a grudge is an understatement of gargantuan proportion. She breaks into the house, steals, murders, sets fires, and even feigns death, all to ruin Knox and Tracey's lives. How will it end?
Is It Any Good?
This thriller is predictable and unbelievable. Paradise Cove, a pretend real-life horror movie without an original move in it, regurgitates plot and socioeconomic settings from such better-paced fare as Fatal Attraction, Pacific Heights, and The Stepfather (1987). Believability immediately jumps out the window with the attractive Bauer van Straten in the role of a startlingly well-put-together homeless woman, who sports a large diamond ring and unnaturally overstuffed lips that look as if they've just been injected with expensive facial filler by a Beverly Hills doctor. Even her strategically torn dress looks stylish, and it certainly hasn't been long since her golden tresses were treated to a salon bleach job.
Everything else about this movie is equally implausible. After a messy murder, why don't the police even notice that a prominent local citizen is missing? Why would anyone dealing with a person who repeatedly breaks into his house ever leave large sums of money lying in a drawer? Aren't police trained to recognize signs of arson anymore? When a house burns, why don't neighbors call the fire department? But what feels really icky is the choice to make a homeless person the villain (not that anyone else here embodies model citizenry). Never mind that her objective is to regain possession of a multimillion-dollar beach house that she lost because of non-payment. In all, it's less than helpful when media suggest people without housing are murderous, lazy, entitled loonies, encouraging misleading notions and prejudice against a group that already has enough problems. But the filmmakers take liberties in many areas. Perhaps the most hilarious fantasy promoted here is the notion that a contractor could wade through the local Malibu bureaucracy to secure a home renovation permit in just a few days. Yeah, right.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about thrillers. Why are they so popular? How does this one compare to others you've seen?
Does this movie add anything useful to the dialogue about the problems of people who lack housing, or is it just exploiting a hot issue for cheap drama? Explain.
In what ways does this movie seem unrealistic? Are those departures from reality OK in a thriller? Why, or why not?
While the movie paints Bree as evil, mentally disturbed, or both, it makes a point of offering her side of the argument regarding the home's ownership. Who do you think owned the house? Why?
Movie Details
- On DVD or streaming : February 12, 2021
- Cast : Todd Grinnell , Mena Suvari , Kristen Bauer can Straten
- Director : Martin Guigui
- Inclusion Information : Latino Movie Director(s) , Female Movie Actor(s)
- Studio : Quiver Distribution
- Genre : Thriller
- Run time : 103 minutes
- MPAA rating :
- Last updated : March 1, 2021
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