Return to Paradise

Sheriff, a New York limo driver; Tony, a recently-engaged architect, and "tree-hugger" Lewis met in Malaysia and spent a month enjoying its "rum, girls and good cheap hash." Two years later, a lawyer approaches Sheriff and Tony and informs them that Lewis was subsequently busted with the trio's discarded hash and will be sentenced to death in eight days...unless they return to Malaysia and serve three years apiece in prison--six if just one of them agrees to go. What would Casablanca's Rick Blaine do? What would do you? This moral dilemma makes for riveting drama, and the performances by Anne Heche as the driven lawyer, Vince Vaughn as the conscience-stirred Sheriff and Joaquin Phoenix as the unfortunate prisoner, are good. But the script lapses into melodrama and cliché, particularly in the overdrawn character of a journalist (Jada Pinkett Smith) who wants to break the story to advance her career. Lost in the summer shuffle, this thoughtful adult drama still deserves to find an audience on video. Recommended. (K. Lee Benson)