Review: Ticket to Paradise

George Clooney and Julia Roberts are back on the big screen as a divorced couple who can’t stand each other but are forced to work together to thwart their high-flying daughter’s sudden marriage to a Balinese seaweed farmer.  Screwball comedy at it's finest? Not quite.

When their high-flying daughter Lily (Kaitlyn Dever) announces she's leaving it all behind to live in Bali, her divorced parents David (Clooney) and Georgia (Roberts) decide to put aside their mutual loathing of each other and join forces to ruin the wedding... by pretending to go along with it while sabotaging things behind the scenes.

This is the kind of star focused set-up that should work – it’s not like Roberts and Clooney are without their charms. Yet the end result is little more than a forgettable wander through some scenic countryside (it was filmed in Queensland, doubling for Bali) waiting for the sun to go down and the drinks to come out.

Jokes are few and far between, comedy set-pieces never arrive (the mystery of how Robert’s character slices bananas without opening them is never solved), the central plot is so mean-spirited the film gives up on it halfway through and the characters are so thin they vanish when they turn sideways.

Worse, Lily's marriage is clearly the right move for her, leaving her parents looking like nasty killjoys no matter how well meaning their motivation. They're not cartoony enough to be fun bad guys, Lily is too bland and nice to hold much interest, and by the time the film gets around to just having Roberts and Clooney enjoy each other's company the damage has been done.

Still, they clearly have serious star power and the chemistry between them sparkles. The scenery is never less than nice to look at too: if you're happy to watch what is basically an animated holiday postcard - and don't mind a vague but consistent feeling that this whole thing is a missed opportunity - this is a decent enough way to forget your cares for a hundred minutes

- Anthony Morris