Palm Beach: Inoffensive, easygoing and just fine

If you want a low-commitment movie that’s unchallenging, then maybe this is for you. Maybe.

The real star of Palm Beach is that amazing house, and its deck.

The fancy but unassuming abode sits on a hill taking in that jaw-dropping view of pristine blue water surrounded by the lush greenery.

If only the movie was as satisfying and impressive as that view.

Australian movie Palm Beach, directed and co-written by Rachel Ward and starring Bryan Brown, Sam Neill, Greta Scacchi and Richard E. Grant, opens today and it’ll appeal to a certain demographic who is looking for something breezy and unchallenging.

Palm Beach is a movie that falls square in the “it’s fine” category. Its writing is lazy but it’s not offensive. It’s certainly not going to inspire you to loathing or, well, much of anything.

Richard E. Grant is rightly protecting his English skin from the harsh Australian sun.

This is a low commitment drama with charismatic actors in a beautiful setting.

Sometimes it’s silly, sometimes it’s boring and sometimes it’s sweet. My movie companion James Weir compared it to an episode of Packed to the Rafters.

Frank (Brown) is recently retired, having sold the T-shirt business that’s collected him a tidy sum and that stunning house. But he’s having a later-in-life crisis now that he’s so unmoored.

For his birthday, he and wife Charlotte (Scacchi) have invited their nearest and dearest for a weekend of celebrations, including the members of a band — Billy (Grant) and Leo (Neill) — he used to manage who had one hit way back when.

Look, it’s fine.

Frank’s wealth is apparent not just because of the house but also in the bottles of Dom Perignon nestled between the prawns and pavlova spread laid out on the deck.

That wealth is a sore point for some, namely Billy who’s struggling to eke out a living and only flew from England to Sydney (in business class no less) on Frank’s dime.

Meanwhile, Leo approaches Charlotte and says he wants to reneg on a 20-year-old agreement formed between the friends, a move that could unleash chaos if the secret is revealed.

When you gather that many people with that much personal history between them in one house, it’s a recipe for resentment, regret, old grudges and frayed tempers.

Getting the gang back together.

So Palm Beach is pretty much what you expect — there are few surprises — but that’s kind of the point, right? An easygoing couple of hours hanging out with some favourite actors (which also includes Jacqueline McKenzie, Heather Mitchell, Aaron Jeffery, Matilda Brown and Claire van der Boom).

It’s not a particularly emotional exercise, nor is it a cerebral one, unless the middling problems of wealthy white people get your synapses firing. It’s just fine.

But, damn, that view, my god, that view is something to behold.

Rating: 3/5

Palm Beach is in cinemas from today

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