Synopsis
Her mother in Kenya, 13-year-old Melanie spends her summer vacation at a strict diet camp set in the Austrian countryside. Between workouts and nutrition classes, pillow fights and first cigarettes, she falls in love with a doctor 40 years her senior.
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Cast
- Melanie LenzMelanie
- Joseph LorenzArzt
- Verena LehbauerVerena
- Michael ThomasSports Coach
- Vivian BartschNutritionist
- Johanna SchmidHanni
- Maria HofstätterAnna Maria
Recommendations
- 83
The A.V. Club
This tale of a creepy pedophilic relationship is the most tender, nuanced, and deeply felt picture Seidl has ever made. What’s more, there’s no need to have seen the other two films, as Hope works beautifully all by its lonesome. - 80
The Guardian
The love story – and it can be called that – between the doctor and Melanie is presented with candour and tenderness. There is a new humanity to Seidl's work; it could be his best film so far. - 80
The Hollywood Reporter
There’s uncustomary warmth here and a sensitivity to the characters’ vulnerabilities that often is missing from this director’s work. - 80
Empire
Tying up his trilogy in style, Seidl's film unsettles and provokes with wit and composure. - 80
Total Film
Against the odds this is a sometimes droll and surprisingly tender affair, and a fitting end to Seidl’s magnum opus. - 80
Los Angeles Times
The most hopeful — and the best — of this solid and unsettling series. - 75
Miami Herald
Paradise: Hope plays better if you’ve seen the previous two movies, so you can savor the reach and scope of Seidl’s trilogy. But the film stands alone as a tender portrait of adolescence at its most vulnerable and how we manage to survive it, even when surrounded by predators and wolves. - 75
The Playlist
We can't help but feel that by comparison with the meaty and compelling issues he takes on so fearlessly, so scabrously in the other entries, Paradise: Hope ends up somewhat toothless.
