Credit: Netflix

George Clooney and Julia Roberts on a beach… Let’s start there because that’s probably why most people were keen to watch Ticket to Paradise. Yet the funny thing about the film isn’t that it stars two of Hollywood’s biggest names. It’s that the film was released in 2022, earned decent box-office numbers and disappeared before it found a fresh audience on Netflix.

You see, years later, viewers are still watching the same thing cinema people discovered back then: put Clooney and Roberts in the same room and chances are people will have a good time.

And the premise… It couldn’t be simpler. David and Georgia Cotton are divorced. Not amicably divorced, either. These two have spent years perfecting the art of annoying each other. When their daughter Lily goes to Bali after graduating and announces that she is marrying a local man named Gede, both parents react with horror. And their reasoning is straightforward. They fell in love young and got married just to see the relationship fail. In their minds, Lily is about to make the exact same mistake.

So off they go to Bali, to meet this “guy” their daughter wants to marry. Of course, any rom-com binger can guess where things are going after this. The question isn’t whether David and Georgia will rediscover old feelings. The question is how many arguments they will have before admitting it.

That’s where the film earns its keep. Clooney’s David is a master of ragebaiting. Roberts gives Georgia enough tough time that she is no longer an ordinary rom-com wife either. Put them together in a room, and every conversation becomes a battle for the last word. Half the entertainment comes from watching neither of them surrender.

What’s surprising is that Ticket to Paradise marked the first traditional romantic comedy starring Clooney and Roberts as romantic leads. Think about that for a second. The pair first appeared together in Ocean’s Eleven more than twenty years ago. They have worked together multiple times since then. But this was the first time someone looked at them and decided to cast them opposite of each other. Well, better late than never. Their real-life friendship plays a huge role in their chemistry. And that’s why it looks so natural.

The film’s box-office performance also deserves a mention. For years, industry experts kept declaring that romantic comedies no longer worked in cinemas. Then Ticket to Paradise turned up and earned nearly $169 million worldwide against a reported budget of around $60 million. Not bad for a genre many people had already written off.

Perhaps that’s why the film has connected with Netflix viewers. Nobody needs a character guide before watching. No homework required. No twelve-season commitment waiting on the other side. Instead, it offers two movie stars doing what they do best. They argue and flirt, and the audience comes along for the ride.