Trapped in Paradise (1994) - Review

Trapped in Paradise is a 1994 comedy film starring Nicolas Cage, Jon Lovitz, and Dana Carvey. The three play brothers Bill, Dave, and Alvin Firpo. Dave (Lovitz), a con man, and Alvin (Carvey), a kleptomaniac, are recently released convicts remanded into the custody of their brother Bill (Cage), a restaurant manager who struggles to keep his own nose clean. After hearing about a bank with lax security in a rural Pennsylvania town, the three rob the bank only to start encountering trouble from trying to escape the town, aptly named Paradise, from state police, FBI, and a pair of locals. Over the course of Christmas Eve, the three each find themselves charmed by the small town and attempt to change their natures.

Trapped in Paradise is a finished product that is just a shame in its released state. How can a movie starring Jon Lovitz and Dana Carvey be anything but funny? In fact, the movie tries at every point to be a comedy, but only elicited a couple small chuckles toward the end of the movie - with a runtime of nearly two hours, this made for a pretty bland experience. The interplay between the three protagonists was quite humorous, even if it didn't elicit any laughs, while capturing the brotherly spirit any dysfunctional family. What tanked my enjoyment of the movie ultimately was reducing Carvey down to a caricature of his comedic self. Lovitz playing the same comedic straight man that he always seems to play was not detrimental to my experience, but his character, much like Carvey's Alvin, stayed flat the entire time. Cage's Bill Firpo continues his streak in this time in his filmography as trying to establish himself as an everyman. In fact, Cage stands out in this movie for being as normal of a person as possible, even though Bill is still a more subdued version of his brothers. Sean McCann as the police chief of the idyllic town and Richard Jenkins as FBI agent Peyser were welcome faces to see throughout the movie, which the movie could have used more of, even if they were featured fairly prominently in the ending scenes of the movie. While Trapped in Paradise is full of raw acting talent, it really failed to come together. Trapped in Paradise is too focused on reducing the output of Lovitz and Carvey for both to shine as comedic roles, and while the performance by Cage was appropriately grounded, it does not save this movie from being in the pile of forgotten Christmas tales.