Art house: Paradise Trips – delicate Belgian drama on culture and generation gaps
The 2015 film, which is set among Europe’s New Age/alternative community, reflects the contradictions of real life
A film about culture and generation gaps, Belgian director Raf Reyntjens’ Paradise Trips (2015) is a delicately written drama that gently makes its point. Avoiding overwrought scenes of conflict, Reyntjens allows his characters to resolve their differences in a way that mirrors the contradictions of real life.
The film is set among Europe’s New Age/alternative community, which is rarely shown internationally on screen.
The story is seen through the eyes of Mario Dockers (Gene Bervoets, who won an Ensor Award – the Belgian equivalent of the Oscars – for his performance), the elderly, conservative-minded owner/driver of a tour bus company called Paradise Trips who runs tours for pensioners.
When Mario is asked by an old friend to transport a bunch of New Age hippies to a music festival in Croatia, he feels obliged to accept.
Although he doesn’t agree with their anti-establishment views, things don’t go too badly, and he makes friends with a young boy who seems disillusioned with the freewheeling life of the group. But things take an unexpected turn when he finds out that the boy is, in fact, the child of his estranged son, Johnny (Jeroen Perceval).