Feting ‘Paradise’ in a Parking Lot

The Scene: Monday’s premiere of PolyGram’s “Return to Paradise” at the Village theater. The “conscience thriller” (will two friends submit to imprisonment in Malaysia to save a third from hanging?) was compared to “Midnight Express,” “A Tale of Two Cities” and a Men’s Journal top 10 bummer vacations issue.

Who Was There: The film’s stars, Vince Vaughn, Anne Heche and Jada Pinkett Smith; director Joseph Ruben; and 1,000 guests, including Julianne Moore, Gus Van Sant, Bill Bellamy, Ally Sheedy, Joey Lauren Adams, producers Lawrence Bender and Brad Krevoy, ICM agent Lou Pitt and studio execs Michael Kuhn, Andy Fogelson, Peter Graves and Bruce Feldman.

Noted: Offering a ‘90s Starbucks-generation take on the American-stuck-in-rodent-infested-Third-World-prison movie, one screenwriter dubbed the film “Midnight Espresso.”

Quoted: “I don’t see it as a sad film,” said Heche. “I see it as a heart-wrenching film. It’s about seeing another person for everything they are and risking everything to have that person continue to see you.”

Hollywood Moment: One industry savant’s droll comment on the film’s financial prospects was, “I don’t think they’re counting on the Malaysian video sell-through.”

The Party: A sumptuous, multicultural Southeast Asian affair designed by Jeffrey Best that began with Taiko drummers leading the guests in a procession through Westwood. They were greeted by an eight-piece Balinese gamelan orchestra. The entryway was strewn with rose petals, and a parking lot was covered with 70 tons of sand-gravel mix and done as a Malay marketplace with a shadow-puppet theater, caged chickens, a “hammock zone,” a presiding Javanese deity, noodle shops and bazaar stalls serving as food buffets.

Upside: The party signals a breakthrough for live poultry at Hollywood parties.

Downside: If the Asian financial crisis wasn’t enough, the film should nail the coffin shut on Malaysian tourism.

It’s Time to Shut the Bar When: A drunk jumps on one of the prop bicycle rickshaws and drives it (and the squawking, caged chicken on the back) through the party.