Paradise Is Burning movie storyline. In a working-class neighborhood in Sweden, sisters Laura (sixteen years old), Mira (twelve years old) and Steffi (seven years old) manage on their own, abandoned to their own devices by an absent mother. With summer coming and without parents, life is wild and carefree, lively and anarchic.
But when social services call a meeting to prevent the girls from being placed in foster care and separated, Laura must find someone who poses as their mother. Laura keeps the threat looming over them a secret, so as not to worry her younger sisters. But as the moment of truth approaches, new tensions arise that force the three sisters to walk the thin line that divides the euphoria of total freedom from the harsh reality of growth.
Paradise Is Burning (Swedish: Paradiset Brinner) is a 2023 drama film co-written and directed by Mika Gustafson, in her fictional feature debut. It stars Bianca Delbravo, Dilvin Asaad, Safira Mossberg, Ida Engvoll, Marta Oldenburg, Mitja Siren, Alexander Öhrstrand. The screenplay was written by Mika Gustafson and Alexander Öhrstrand.
Film Review for Paradise Is Burning
With powerful performances from its young stars and a moving message about the need for connection in a chaotic, undependable world, Mika Gustafson’s engrossing, realistic drama Paradise Is Burning tells the story of three sisters hoping to get by on their own while flying under the radar of the Swedish social services system. But as life tries to force them to grow up too quickly, they also strive to find moments of joy.
Sixteen-year-old Laura (Bianca Delbravo) is working hard to keep things together for her younger sisters Mira (Dilvin Asaad) and Steffi (Safira Mossberg) in their unreliable mother’s absence; it’s clear this isn’t the first time their mom has been gone, but it might be the longest. Laura knows that if anyone official finds out that the girls are living on their own, they’ll likely be split up and put into foster care. So she does what she has to, from stealing laundry detergent and food to turning in forged school-absence notes. But when an in-person home visit becomes inevitable, she must figure out what to do next.
Simultaneously, Laura desperately needs to escape the responsibility weighing on her, even if only for moments at a time. So she breaks into unoccupied houses — sometimes with a group of friends so they can have a spontaneous pool party, sometimes on her own so she can pretend she lives a different life. Her adventures appeal to Hanna (Ida Engvoll), an adult whom Laura unexpectedly befriends and who appears to be going through her own personal crisis.
Laura thinks Hanna might be the answer to her problems, but nothing is simple in this story, and tricky situations don’t have neat, cinematic resolutions. Meanwhile, both Mira and Steffi grapple with the family’s lack of stability in their own ways, with Mira unexpectedly befriending a man who has karaoke ambitions, and Steffi barely avoiding serious consequences when she wanders, free-range, around the neighborhood.
Through it all, the girls’ love for each other is what grounds them — that, and the group of girlfriends that surrounds them for milestones like Mira’s first period and Steffi’s tooth loss. The sisters’ moments of celebration and fun with their friends are some of the movie’s most buoyant, and they speak to the power of finding your people. Gustafson — who also co-wrote the script with Alexander Öhrstrand — captures it all with authentic grit, eliciting lovely performances from the three girls and raising thoughtful questions about a society that would let them fall through the cracks in the first place. — Betsy Bozdech
Life is not easy for three Swedish sisters. Mom is long gone, leaving 16-year-old Laura to parent 12-year-old Mira and seven-year-old Steffi. The freezer is broken and there’s no money for groceries so family shoplifting outings are a thing. And in their friend group, breaking into houses is something done for kicks. So when social services calls and announces they are going to make a home visit and need to meet with the girl’s mother, Laura goes into overdrive to find someone to be an impersonator.
Meeting middle-class Hanna seems like the answer to a prayer, especially when the woman is so fascinated by Laura’s criminal adventures. The irony that Hanna herself is a checked out mom, not so different from her own is lost on the desperate girl. Documentarian Mika Gustafson makes an assured debut in a film that often unreels like cinema verite. But the drama’s greatest strength is its characters, particularly Laura as actor Bianca Delbravo in her first feature offers a nuanced portrayal of a teen in a desperate situation trying hard and flailing at adulting.
Paradise is Burning takes us so believably into the lives of three well-intentioned but almost feral sisters that we almost reach out to hug them. The trust she had to create with her young actresses in order to get performances so unaffected it feels like we are watching real life as it unfolds.
Paradise is Burning is a garden of wildflowers. Left untended, three sisters grow up feral, fierce, and fragile. Within the circle of their love and reliance on one other, the three become substitutes for their own mother. Each of them contributing something to the growth of the whole. Laura, Mira, and Steffi are free, but it isn’t forever. At the edges of their delicate ruse, a social worker is knocking on the garden gate. Triggering the looming sense it will all come burning down. Until then we worry for and live vicariously through them. That is the movie’s strength, the pull of one last fling of freedom at the end of youth, the dangers of adulthood, and the precipice of reality.
Paradise is Burning captures the best and worst of sibling sisterhood to such a stunning degree that it deserves a place as a summer cult classic. It has, from beginning to end, a sort of authentic quality that could only come with a film co-written by a woman and with women all the way up and down the line, from Mika Gustafson’s direction to the impeccable performances, to Sine Vadstrup Brooker’s cinematography and Catherina Nyqvist Ehrnrooth’s production design. It feels written especially for sisters, both born and chosen. So many around the world can relate to the aspects of the film that center on being at risk or needing to become an adult before their time. No wonder it’s cleaning up the awards on the film festival circuit. See it if and when you can.
Swedish director/co-writer Mika Gustafson’s incendiary drama is about Laura, Steffi and Mira — three sisters ranging in age from seven to 16 — whose mother abandons them for long stretches of time. The film takes place during one of those stretches of time. Laura, Steffi and Mira are thoroughly believable and tremendously compelling characters. Performances by the three young actresses who portray the girls are flawless. Their story and arc elicit empathy. the film reminds us that even first world countries — like Sweden — that proudly credit themselves as and are considered to be economically privileged and socially conscious welfare democracies, have underprivileged citizens who struggle to keep from falling between the ever increasing cracks.
Paradise Is Burning (2023)
Paradiset Brinner
Directed by: Mika Gustafson
Starring: Bianca Delbravo, Dilvin Asaad, Safira Mossberg, Ida Engvoll, Marta Oldenburg, Mitja Siren, Alexander Öhrstrand
Screenplay by: Mika Gustafson, Alexander Öhrstrand
Production Design by: Catharina Nyqvist Ehrnrooth
Cinematography by: Sine Vadstrup Brooker
Film Editing by: Anders Skov
Costume Design by: Susse Roos
Art Direction by: Lisanne Fransen, Louise Tungården
Music by: Giorgio Giampà
MPAA Rating: Hohe.
Distributed by: Room 8 Films (United States)(theatrical), Angel Films (Denmark)
Release Date: September 8, 2023 (Venice)
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