Paradise Is Burning
Mika Gustafson's Paradise Is Burning is a love letter to sisterhood centred on extraordinary performances from its young cast
Mika Gustafson’s drama follows three sisters in a working-class community in Sweden who are left to fend for themselves after their mother leaves. As we watch them enjoy sun-soaked pool parties, bubble-covered slip-and-slides and living room dance parties, it feels as though we are witnessing sibling intimacy that thrives without the watchful eye of adult norms. The tenderness between the sisters, combined with the soft beauty of the cinematography, gives the film a sense of playfulness that centres their adolescent experiences over the pain of their mother’s absence.
However, the flip side of this adult-free existence is dark. The eldest sister, Laura (Bianca Delbravo), is under constant pressure to avoid the looming visit from Social Services and act as a parent to her younger sisters. Amid this situation, she meets Hannah (Ida Engvoll), an older woman who accompanies her on break-ins to rich homes, where they parade around in other people’s clothes, read their diaries and eat their food.
This mutual escapism from their daily lives embodies the film’s many paradoxes: a house with no parent, yet filled with love; fancy homes with no one in them; sibling love and hate. The knife edges of life’s emotions are explored in Paradise Is Burning with a nuance that always manages to centre joy. This is led by the quiet ferocity of each sister’s sense of survival – that Gustafson manages to coax these performances from such young actors is a gift to this tender film.
Released 30 Aug by CONIC; certificate TBC