The movie did not disappoint. Judd gives what is probably one of the great "unseen" performances of the '90's. It makes you wonder all the more why she seems compelled to waste her talent in cynical Hollywood tripe like Double Jeopardy (on the other hand she probably was paid more money for one day of her work on that film than she got for all of Ruby in Paradise).
Ruby in Paradise has no real "plot" as such. It opens with a young woman loading up her car and fleeing a young man who it is implied is her husband or (more likely)boyfriend. Why she's leaving and what the circumstances surrounding her getaway are is never made clear or spelled out, and this is deliberate I think, and a wise choice. She winds up in a resort town in southern Florida that she remembers visiting on a family vacation as a child, and from there on, we get to pass through a few months of Ruby's life as she gets a job, makes a couple of new friends, gets briefly involved with a real Mr. Wrong, and then seems to meet a possible Mr. Right, and so forth.
That's really it in a nutshell, but it really doesn't do the experience of watching this fascinating little film justice. Like Seinfeld, a sitcom which was "about nothing" but at it's best was really about everything, Ruby in Paradise lets us experience the life of an initially aimless but determined young woman as she takes her first tentative steps towards full-blown adulthood. By the end of the movie, we have come to know Ruby well enough to feel very pleased by her progress thus far, and wishing we could catch up with her again in a few years and see how she's making out. Indeed, if Ruby in Paradise were a novel instead of a movie, it could definately be the beginning of a series, similar to the "Rabbit" novels of John Updike.
Moreover, although the film is about a female protaganist, and is told entirely from her point of view (indeed, she narrates periodically in voice-over), it is by no means a "chick flick." One of the numerous pleasures of the film is how it sidesteps, or puts a different spin on, all the various cliches we've come to expect (and even accept)in this genre.
This film is probably not for everybody. It was obviously a low-budget affair, and has the grainy look of being possibly shot in 16 mm and then blown up. It is also VERY low-key, especially the first half-hour or so. But, if you've got a couple of free hours, and you feel like checking out something other than the whiz-bang flicks on the new releases shelf, this movie offers a lot of quiet, thoughtful pleasure.
