Genre: Drama
Director: Ulrich Seidl
Cast: Margarethe Tiesel, Peter Kuzungu, Inge Maux, Dunja Sowinetz, Helen Brugat, Gabriel Nguma Mwarua, Carlos Mkutano
Writers: Ulrich Seidl, Veronika Franz
Rating: R 18
Run Time: 120 min
Synopsis
On the beaches of Kenya they're known as "Sugar Mamas:"
European women who seek out African boys selling love to earn a
living. Teresa, a 50-year-old Austrian and mother of a daughter
entering puberty, travels to this vacation paradise. She goes from
one Beach Boy to the next, from one disappointment to the next and
finally she must recognize: On the beaches of Kenya love is a
business.
"Paradise: Love" tells not without humor of sex tourism, older
women and young men, the market value of sexuality, the power of
skin color, Europe and Africa, and the exploited, who have no
choice but to exploit others. Ulrich Seidl's film is the opener in
the Paradise Trilogy about three women in
one family who take separate vacations: one as a sex tourist,
another as a Catholic missionary (Paradise:
Faith) and the third at a
diet camp for teenagers (Paradise:
Hope). Three films, three women, three stories of the
longing to find happiness today.
Official Competition, Cannes Film Festival