Reel Paradise - Austin American-Statesman movie review

'Reel Paradise' documents family living in Fiji

By PATRICK BEACH
Austin American-Statesman

Well-meaning, uptight, a little brusque and kind of awkward — hey, I could be this guy! — indie movie guru and author John Pierson decided to move his family for a year to the Fijian island of Taveuni as a grand adventure/stunt/way to broaden the children/sabbatical. And, times being what they are, he invited filmmaker Steve ("Hoop Dreams") James along to document the final month of the culture clash — between Fijians and the Piersons and within the Pierson family itself.

Like Pierson's immodest experiment, the resulting film, "Reel Paradise," is as beautiful as, um, a tropical island and as messy and mixed-up as real life.

Wellspring

'Reel Paradise'

3 out of 5 stars

Directors: Steve James, Steve James (II)
Starring: John Pierson, Janet Pierson, Georgia Pierson, Wyatt Pierson
Run time: 114 minutes
Release date: August 17, 2005
Rating: R for language including sexual references, and brief crude humor.

On the web
Official movie site
View the trailer

Pierson, former host of IFC's "Split Screen," shows unfettered joy at audiences' reaction to the movies he screens at the 180 Meridian Cinema — The Three Stooges, "Apocalypse Now Redux," "X-Men 2," "Jackass." That would seem the only uncomplicated component of this tale.

The International Date Line runs through the island and, appropriately enough, divisions abound: Between native Fijians and the seemingly more enterprising Indo-Fijians. Between Pierson and local Catholic church and school officials who campaign against the pernicious effects of Yankee popular culture (Pierson insists on showing the movies for free, thus undermining the capitalist work ethic the church has attempted to inculcate). Between Pierson, wife Janet and adolescent daughter Georgia, who's rebelling. Between the parents and their younger boy, Wyatt, who's plenty sharp but has quite a mouth. There are accusations of playing up confrontations for the cameras. As if a house with two teenagers wasn't already electric with tension.

Compared to the islanders, the Piersons live in comfort. They have a rent house that comes with an intemperate landlord and a cook, and presumably don't have to do their laundry by whacking it on rocks, as James repeatedly shows islanders doing. (They now live in Austin's Hyde Park, where washing machines abound.) But, because this is essentially reality TV stretched to almost two too-long hours, there must be conflict galore: projectionists get drunk, the Pierson home is burgled, Georgia doesn't come home and Pierson is vilified for writing in the Los Angeles Times that, on Taveuni, Curly is God. (Memo to anybody else who might try this: If you want to get along, and Mass starts at 7 p.m., don't start the movie at 7:30.)

Pierson is ultimately a winning presence, although his motivation is a weird blend of drive, naivete and calculation — but then, that's how producers' reps operate. And everyone but perhaps the humorless church leaders are aware of the artifice of the construct. Islanders and the Piersons know the experiment will only last a year. And, if asked what they needed, a free screening of "Bend It Like Beckham" wouldn't top the list. The movies allow us to escape our own lives, but eventually we have to go home.