Film

Paradise Hills

Name: Paradise Hills
Genre: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Thriller
Released: 2019
Cast: Emma Roberts, Eiza González, Milla Jovovich, Danielle Macdonald, Awkwafina

Thriller

A stylish sci-fi thriller about a reform academy for inconvenient young women, where glossy surfaces hide something sinister. It's visually striking and genuinely weird—part dystopian allegory, part escape caper, wholly committed to its pastel nightmare aesthetic. For anyone who loves bold, strange cinema that swings for the fences.

TMDb rating

3.0

If you liked this

Sucker Punch2011

Another wildly ambitious film about imprisoned women fighting back through imagination and action. Same director (Zack Snyder) channelling righteous fury through wildly inventive visuals and genre-bending sequences.

But Loudly divisive about its own themes. The tone lurches between playful and serious in ways that either entrance or exhaust you.

Escape Room2019

Same year, same DNA: young people trapped in a high-concept location uncovering the system's horrifying logic. Claustrophobic, clever, and genuinely inventive about how to create tension from limited space.

But Relies heavily on jump scares and contrivance. The final act asks you to accept some pretty wild revelations.

Nope2022

A sunlit nightmare about institutions that profit from exploitation. Gorgeous and unsettling in equal measure, with the same eye for production design as something sinister lurking beneath surfaces.

But More subtle and slower-burn than you might want. Rewards patience; punishes impatience.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Paradise Hills

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)2020

Both centre on female outsiders systemically imprisoned or controlled who discover their real enemy isn't each other but the institution itself. Both ask: what happens when women stop internalising the cruelty and redirect it outward?

The DNA is nearly identical—young women considered disposable, brilliant and strange, turning the system against itself—but told in full-throttle colour and humour. Same revolutionary energy, wildly different register. Proof the story works in multiple keys.

But Aggressively loud and jokey. If you wanted Paradise Hills' quiet menace, this swings hard the other way.

Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) poster

The Facility2012

Lower-budget but fiercer: young people confined and experimented on, uncovering corruption from within. Raw and urgent where Paradise Hills is stylised, but the moral core is identical.

But Shot on a shoestring and it shows. No production design budget, and the pacing stutters occasionally.

Thoroughbreds2018

Two young women on the margins of privilege conspiring against the system. Darkly funny, deeply unsettling, and obsessed with the gap between how wealthy girls are supposed to behave and what they actually think.

But Very slow and deliberately awkward. If you need plot momentum, this will feel glacial.

Cam2018

A woman trapped by an institution that controls and commodifies her. Surreal, horrifying, and surprisingly moving. The visual language is as strange and specific as Paradise Hills demands.

But Deeply uncomfortable and genuinely bleak. There is no catharsis here, only recognition.

Ginger Snaps2000

Young women outside the acceptable pale, hunted by systems that can't tolerate them. Transforms body horror into coming-of-age parable. Cult classic that earned it.

But Canadian low-budget film from 2000. The technical execution is rougher than you might expect, and the early scenes are genuinely annoying.

The Platform2019

Same year, same thematic project: a gilded cage that grinds people up, shot in sumptuous colour, anchored by a simple visual metaphor that bleeds meaning. Angry and elegant.

But Bleak and repetitive by design. If you're looking for hope or character development, you won't find it.

Crimson Peak2015

Both films believe that visual design can embody psychological imprisonment. Both use colour and architecture as characters. Both insist that beautiful things can be poisonous.

Guillermo del Toro's haunted-house romance also uses production design as narrative: every room is a trap, every surface conceals violence. Lush, grotesque, beautiful, and deeply structured around women seeing through pretty lies.

But Gothic melodrama, heavy on style and atmosphere. If you need plot to move briskly, it will feel self-indulgent.

The Neon Demon2016

Both watch young women realise they're products in a system designed to extract value from them. Both are visually elaborate critiques of how women are made into objects. Both refuse easy resolution.

Nicolas Winding Refn's synth-soaked nightmare about young women fed into a system that consumes them. Neon-lit and hypnotic rather than warm, but the same thesis: youth and beauty as a commodity that grinds people down.

But Almost entirely plot-free. A mood that lasts 118 minutes. For some viewers that's transcendent; for others, unbearable.