{ "id": "ep8eyw3zzc", "slug": "come-see-the-paradise", "title": "Come See the Paradise", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "label": "War and historical films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.historical-dramas-and-epics", "label": "Historical dramas and epics", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.historical-dramas-and-epics" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.historical-dramas-and-epics.alpha-symbols-to-l", "label": "Titles symbols to L", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.historical-dramas-and-epics.alpha-symbols-to-l" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.historical-dramas-and-epics.alpha-symbols-to-l.alpha-1-to-em", "label": "Titles 1 to Em", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.historical-dramas-and-epics.alpha-symbols-to-l.alpha-1-to-em" } ], "geo": [ { "id": "geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "label": "United States · 1946 to 2000: War and historical films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "path": [ { "id": "geo.us", "label": "United States", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1946", "label": "United States · 1946 to 2000", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1946.culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946.culture" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1946.culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946.culture.performance" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "label": "War and historical films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical" } ] } ], "excerpt": "Come See the Paradise is Alan Parker's 1990 drama starring Dennis Quaid and Tamlyn Tomita about an interracial marriage and the WWII internment of Japanese Americans, premiered at Cannes 1990 and released by Fox.", "snippet": "Come See the Paradise is Alan Parker's 1990 drama starring Dennis Quaid and Tamlyn Tomita about an interracial marriage and the WWII internment of Japanese Americans, premiered at Cannes 1990 and released by Fox.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.historical-dramas-and-epics.alpha-symbols-to-l.alpha-1-to-em", "markdown": "# Come See the Paradise\n\n*Come See the Paradise* is a 1990 American drama film, written and directed by [Alan Parker](https://www.edgepedia.org/alan-parker), that follows an interracial marriage between an Irish-American union organizer and a Japanese-American woman, and the forced internment of her family after the attack on [Pearl Harbor](https://www.edgepedia.org/pearl-harbor)[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE) • [2](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099291/). It stars [Dennis Quaid](https://www.edgepedia.org/dennis-quaid) as Jack McGurn, Tamlyn Tomita as Lily Kawamura, and Sab Shimono as her father Hiroshi[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE).\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Release | Cannes screening 13 May 1990; Los Angeles premiere 17 Dec 1990; opened in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York 23 Dec 1990; wide release 18 Jan 1991[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE) |\n| Format | R-rated drama and romance, 133 minutes, Dolby Stereo[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE) |\n| Key crew | Producer Robert F. Colesberry; cinematographer Michael Seresin; editor Gerry Hambling; music by Randy Edelman[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE) • [3](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/come-see-the-paradise-1991) |\n| Production companies | Lilico Pictures and Dirty Hands Productions, released by Twentieth Century Fox[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE) |\n| Budget | $17.5 (million), which Parker attributed partly to filming on an \"architecturally accurate street\" in Portland's former Japanese neighborhood[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEETHEPARADISE) |\n| Domestic gross | $865,660 at the United States box office[5](https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Come-See-The-Paradise) |\n| Critical score | 64% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer from 11 reviews[6](https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/come-see-the-paradise/umc.cmc.79nqrjshcqz9lgoz7e6rnx516) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Story\n\nThe film opens in 1936 in Brooklyn, New York, where [Jack McGurn](https://www.edgepedia.org/jack-mcgurn), a projectionist and union organizer, sets off a smoke bomb in a theater but breaks with his fellow unionists when they ignite a fire bomb that endangers patrons[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE) • [7](https://www.moviefone.com/movie/come-see-the-paradise/1006907/showtimes/). He flees to Los Angeles and takes a job as a projectionist at a Little Tokyo movie theater owned by Hiroshi Kawamura[8](https://moviemonitor.com/watch/come-see-the-paradise).\n\nJack falls in love with Hiroshi's daughter Lily. Her father opposes the match, and California law at the time prevented mixed-race couples from obtaining a marriage license, so the two elope to Seattle, where they marry and have a daughter, Mini[8](https://moviemonitor.com/watch/come-see-the-paradise) • [9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1991/01/18/reviews/da014b16-2b0f-427d-a36f-889915d957e9/). The marriage strains when Jack resumes union activity, and Lily returns to Los Angeles with Mini shortly before Pearl Harbor[8](https://moviemonitor.com/watch/come-see-the-paradise).\n\nAfter the United States enters World War II, the Kawamura family is sent, along with other Americans of Japanese descent in California, to an internment camp; Lily's father is first detained by the FBI over his involvement in Japanese cultural societies[8](https://moviemonitor.com/watch/come-see-the-paradise) • [9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1991/01/18/reviews/da014b16-2b0f-427d-a36f-889915d957e9/). Jack, ironically, is drafted into the Army, goes AWOL, and searches California for his wife and daughter[6](https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/come-see-the-paradise/umc.cmc.79nqrjshcqz9lgoz7e6rnx516) • [8](https://moviemonitor.com/watch/come-see-the-paradise). Much of the story is told as a flashback, with the adult Lily recounting the events to her young daughter after the war[3](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/come-see-the-paradise-1991).\n\n## Production\n\n**Origins.** Parker, who had just finished *Mississippi Burning* in Los Angeles, had long kept a [Dorothea Lange](https://www.edgepedia.org/dorothea-lange) photograph on his wall showing an elderly Japanese man with his two grandchildren in San Francisco in 1941, awaiting deportation and internment. A conversation with his producer Robert Colesberry about that photograph and the possibility of a film on the internment of [Japanese Americans](https://www.edgepedia.org/japanese-americans) brought the project together[10](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making). Parker read more than fifty books and other research materials over two months and completed the first draft of the screenplay by the end of January 1989[10](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making). Twentieth Century Fox responded enthusiastically to the script[10](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making).\n\n**Casting.** The casting process lasted six months and took open calls to cities with large Asian American populations, including San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, New York, Los Angeles, and Hawaii, with the search extending to Tokyo; Parker reported reading with over two thousand possibilities[10](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making). Studio documents in the AMPAS library state that Parker interviewed 3,000 Japanese Americans during casting and sometimes used details of their conversations to improve the film's texture[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEETHEPARADISE). [Tamlyn Tomita](https://www.edgepedia.org/tamlyn-tomita), born in Okinawa and raised in Los Angeles, was chosen for Lily after testing with Dennis Quaid[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1991/01/18/reviews/da014b16-2b0f-427d-a36f-889915d957e9/) • [10](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making).\n\n**Locations.** [Principal photography](https://www.edgepedia.org/principal-photography) began in Oregon in August 1989[10](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making). To recreate Los Angeles's Little Tokyo, Parker used a former Japanese neighborhood in old downtown Portland called \"J-Town,\" whose accurate period street required little art direction and helped keep the budget low[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEETHEPARADISE). After filming in Portland from 1 August into September 1989, the production moved to [Astoria, Oregon](https://www.edgepedia.org/astoria-oregon); Seattle, Washington; and the [Mojave Desert](https://www.edgepedia.org/mojave-desert) outside Palmdale, California, where the crew built an internment camp[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEETHEPARADISE). A racetrack set at Portland Meadows stood in for the \"assembly centers\" at Santa Anita Racetrack outside Los Angeles and Tanforan Racetrack in San Francisco, where Japanese Americans were temporarily held in May 1942 before the permanent relocation camps were built[10](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making).\n\nThe film also incorporated uncredited scenes from two earlier Fox pictures, *Under Two Flags* (1936) with [Ronald Colman](https://www.edgepedia.org/ronald-colman) and [Claudette Colbert](https://www.edgepedia.org/claudette-colbert), and *Mr. Moto Takes a Chance* (1938) starring [Peter Lorre](https://www.edgepedia.org/peter-lorre)[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEETHEPARADISE).\n\n## Release and reception\n\n*Come See the Paradise* screened on 13 May 1990 at the 43rd Cannes Film Festival, where a Los Angeles Times report described the only debate prompted by the premiere as whether Parker had \"gone soft\" compared with his earlier work; Parker himself called the film \"much softer in attitude\" than his earlier films[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE) • [11](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-05-15-ca-221-story.html). Before the American opening, Parker told the Los Angeles Times that it mattered to him that Japanese Americans enjoy the film: \"Not a day went by that I didn't agonize that I got it right\"[12](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-12-26-ca-6770-story.html).\n\nReception was mixed. Roger Ebert, the longtime film critic of the *Chicago Sun-Times* and winner of the 1975 [Pulitzer Prize](https://www.edgepedia.org/pulitzer-prize) for criticism, gave the film three stars and wrote that it was \"a fable to remind us of how easily we can surrender our liberties, and how much we need them\"[3](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/come-see-the-paradise-1991). Ebert acknowledged the common criticism that a white character provides the audience's point of view in a minority story, but argued that Parker's addition of the Quaid character let the film show how rights were denied for both racial and political reasons[3](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/come-see-the-paradise-1991).\n\nOther reviewers were less favorable. David Ansen of *Newsweek* wrote that Parker had \"succeeded in reducing a powerful story of institutional racism into an unforgivably dull film\"[13](https://watch.plex.tv/en-GB/movie/come-see-the-paradise). Rita Kempley of *The Washington Post* called the film a placid portrait that \"suffers from divided sympathies\" between the Kawamura family and Jack's storyline[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1991/01/18/reviews/da014b16-2b0f-427d-a36f-889915d957e9/). A retrospective survey of contemporary reviews concluded that most reviewers agreed Parker did not do history justice, finding the love story overlong relative to the internment material, while still judging the film historically accurate in retelling actual events of the internment years[14](https://history-on-trial.lib.lehigh.edu/trial/reels/films/list/0_44_5).\n\n**Box office.** The film grossed $865,660 domestically, all of it in the United States[5](https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Come-See-The-Paradise). The *Pacific Citizen*, a Japanese American community newspaper, argued that competent Japanese American actors in front of the camera could not compensate for the absence of Japanese American perspectives behind it[15](https://downloads.densho.org/ddr-pc-63/ddr-pc-63-4-mezzanine-388db17d5d.pdf).\n\n## Place among internment films\n\nThe film belongs to a small group of mainstream American features on the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans. A 2019 *TIME* history of screen depictions of the camps grouped it with *Midway* (1976) and *Snow Falling on Cedars* (1999) as films in which a white male lead appears as a \"noble-hearted savior\" beside a Japanese-American lover, a pattern that Japanese-American scholars such as Renee Tajima-Peña, a filmmaker and professor of Asian American Studies at UCLA, criticized for its sexualized framing of Asian-American women[16](https://time.com/5648993/the-terror-infamy-japanese-american-internment/). An educational study of the film notes that it remains useful for teaching the history of the internment policy and questions of intercultural relations raised by the love story[17](https://asia-u.repo.nii.ac.jp/record/25445/files/11300117.pdf).\n\n## References\n\n1. [Come See the Paradise (1990), AFI Catalog of Feature Films](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEE-THE-PARADISE)\n2. [Come See the Paradise (1990), IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099291/)\n3. [Roger Ebert, \"Come See The Paradise\" review, Chicago Sun-Times, 18 January 1991](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/come-see-the-paradise-1991)\n4. [Come See the Paradise (1990), History section, AFI Catalog](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/58449-COME-SEETHEPARADISE)\n5. [Come See The Paradise (1990), The Numbers](https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Come-See-The-Paradise)\n6. [Come See the Paradise, Apple TV](https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/come-see-the-paradise/umc.cmc.79nqrjshcqz9lgoz7e6rnx516)\n7. [Come See the Paradise, Moviefone](https://www.moviefone.com/movie/come-see-the-paradise/1006907/showtimes/)\n8. [Come See the Paradise, Movie Monitor](https://moviemonitor.com/watch/come-see-the-paradise)\n9. [Rita Kempley, \"Melodrama in 'Paradise',\" The Washington Post, 17 January 1991](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1991/01/18/reviews/da014b16-2b0f-427d-a36f-889915d957e9/)\n10. [Alan Parker, \"The making of Come See the Paradise,\" official website](https://alanparker.com/film/come-see-the-paradise/making)\n11. [Jack Mathews, \"Alan Parker's Sentimental 'Paradise' a Hit in Cannes,\" Los Angeles Times, 15 May 1990](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-05-15-ca-221-story.html)\n12. [\"Short Takes: Parker Hopes Film Rings True,\" Los Angeles Times, 26 December 1990](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-12-26-ca-6770-story.html)\n13. [Come See the Paradise, Plex ratings and reviews](https://watch.plex.tv/en-GB/movie/come-see-the-paradise)\n14. [Come See the Paradise, Reel American History, Lehigh University](https://history-on-trial.lib.lehigh.edu/trial/reels/films/list/0_44_5)\n15. [Pacific Citizen, 1 February 1991, Densho Digital Repository](https://downloads.densho.org/ddr-pc-63/ddr-pc-63-4-mezzanine-388db17d5d.pdf)\n16. [\"The Terror: Infamy Is a Step Forward for Depictions of Japanese-American Internment,\" TIME, 12 August 2019](https://time.com/5648993/the-terror-infamy-japanese-american-internment/)\n17. [Come See the Paradise: Examining Racial Discrimination and Prejudice, Asia University repository](https://asia-u.repo.nii.ac.jp/record/25445/files/11300117.pdf)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › War and historical films (individual works) › Historical dramas and epics › Titles symbols to L › Titles 1 to Em*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/come-see-the-paradise", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/come-see-the-paradise.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"Come See the Paradise\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/come-see-the-paradise. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[Come See the Paradise](https://www.edgepedia.org/come-see-the-paradise)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/come-see-the-paradise](https://www.edgepedia.org/come-see-the-paradise). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"Come See the Paradise\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/come-see-the-paradise. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "Come See the Paradise is Alan Parker's 1990 drama starring Dennis Quaid and Tamlyn Tomita about an interracial marriage and the WWII internment of Japanese Americans, premiered at Cannes 1990 and released by Fox." }