Suleyman just wants to get home to his mum. Unfortunately, he’s got a few obstacles in his way.
That’s the most distilled version of Attack on Paradise, directed by Bob Colaers and starring Saïd Boumazoughe (who also sports a “created by” credit here), which premiered at this year’s Fantastia International Film Festival.
Although the chunk of Paradise takes place over the course of one brutal day, the story is in actuality a seven-year journey for our protagonist, Suleyman. After a rather unlucky encounter with police, Suleyman spends seven presumably long years (they’re unseen within the film itself) in prison. Upon his release, he continues the journey home to his mom that started that fateful evening.
We quickly learn, along with Suleyman, that the apartment complex that he and his mom call home is now overrun by a ruthless crime lord and drug kingpin. It also just so happens to be the case that the day of his return coincides with a police raid on that same complex in the hopes of finally bringing down said kingpin. Thus, our hero’s complicated return journey is born.
Subsequently, the whole thing plays out as a The Raid style movie with much more narrative set up. The first third of the movie introduces our various players, who in addition to Suleyman include the crime lord Prince (Achmed Akkabi), and a rookie officer, Yasime (Clara Cleymans), whose raid participation is her first field mission.
The characters serve as necessary archetypes for the story looking to be told here. Character moments are realized with conventionality that can be read as boring but were clearly never the focus for Paradise. The emphasis is certainly meant to be on the action sequences – which are all staged with flamboyant excitement.
As the groundwork is laid in the film’s first portion, the anticipation for an eruption of violence begins to build. And although we never get a full explosion, the violence does satisfy once it arrives. Cops and neighborhood thugs exchange gunfire, and battle in hand-to-hand brawls alike. Unfortunately for Suleyman he gets caught up in the middle of all of it.
However, Suleyman isn’t your average Joe. He’s got that kind of John Wick or Bryan Mills (Taken series) brand of reluctant and dormant combat skill. But unlike those characters, Suleyman’s background or source of violent competency is curiously missing from Attack on Paradise. Perhaps we’re meant to understand that it derives from a deep love and connection with his mother. Who knew maternal love could inspire such brutal outbursts!
Throughout the course of the film Suleyman has to battle thugs and cops alike. At first, the local gangsters revere him for having done proper hard time. They marvel at the fact that he’s inflicted real carnal pain on police officers, something they’ve only fantasized about up until that point.
Similarly, he finds himself at times aligned with the cops. Specifically with Yasmine, who shares Suleyman’s disdain for bullies. He eventually finds himself teamed up with her in order to accomplish his ultimate goal of a safe and undisturbed reunion with his mom. It does help that Yasmine is motivated by a similar familial reunion with her daughter.
Their fights are often bathed in bright and glowing neons. The camera dances along with characters as they bounce through their staged choreography. It’s all drawing on previous entries in the action genre – a notion that Attack on Paradise wears proudly on its sleeve. It doesn’t quite reach the heights of those inspirations, either because they’re difficult to recreate or because it’s not fully interested in reaching them.
Regardless, it makes for a worthwhile entry in the genre’s tradition. A journey home to mum we see worthy of fighting for.
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