Fantasy Life: A Sort-of Romance About Nothing, Nothing But Eccentrics That Is
By Jim Slotek
Rating: B
With a vibe somewhere in the vicinity of a middling Seinfeld episode, Fantasy Life is the story of two disparate neurotic New Yorkers, an aging actress and a law school drop-out.
Directed by and starring Matthew Shear – a long-time favourite actor of Noah Baumbach (whose style is apparently contagious) – it is kind of a film about nothing, nothing but eccentrics that is. And it is slight but endearing.
It’s separated into chapters, time-jumping through entire seasons. But it is the opening one that provides both the set-ups and the film’s funniest moment.
An embarrassed Sam (Shear) is at the office of his psychiatrist (Judd Hirsch), confessing to horrible thoughts. Jewish himself, his OCD causes him to throw anti-Semitic slurs around in his mind whenever he encounters another person of the same faith. Hirsch’s dry reaction (and demand that he vent those slurs for catharsis) is a gem of comic timing, making it all the more a shame that his character has relatively little time onscreen.
It does, however, prime the viewer for the story to come.
On his sheepish way out the door, the newly unemployed former law student is apprised by the doctor’s wife (Andrea Martin) that her son needs a babysitter for his kids.
As he concedes before the movie ends, Sam is not the best candidate for the job of babysitter – especially given the demands of the household of which he is to become a part.
The pot-smoking, Xanax-popping thirtysomething schlub must stickhandle the demands of three little girls, their macho, narcissistic, alcoholic bass playing rocker father David (Alessandro Nivola), and their fiftysomething mother Dianne (Amanda Peet), an actress trying to wrap her head around her unemployability.
A chapter-turn later, it is assumed things have gone well, sort of. The girls adore Sam. Dianne’s rich father (Bob Balaban) considers him dangerous and threatening. And David is becoming even more of an absent father, taking a three month Australian/New Zealand tour with a band featuring a former member of Government Mule (a relatively obscure musical reference that is meant to convey the fact that Sam is no hipster).
With that solid cast each having a moment, the movie has everyone step back except Sam and Dianne (and you’re not the first person to think Cheers when you hear those names).
With David gone and the girls at school, the two begin a sympathetic relationship that ranges from movie watching to Sam running lines for Dianne’s audition video.
That their relationship would deepen is a given. That the movie doesn’t devolve into a romance (some tentative canoodling aside) is a surprise, I guess. Fantasy Life has a way of moving at its own pace, on a narrative road to nowhere.
What passes for a climax is a dinner featuring all the above characters that goes from civil to cringe at record speed. It puts punctuation on the story of Sam and Dianne, though the film still has some meandering to do before the credits roll.
For a movie that lazily spins its wheels, Fantasy Life is oddly amiable. The only wholly dislikable character is David, and he’s so great at being dislikable, you almost like him for it.
CLICK HERE to read Bonnie Laufer’s interview with Matthew Shear and Amanda Peet.
Fantasy Life. Written and directed by Matthew Shear. Stars Matthew Shear, Amanda Peet, Judd Hirsch. In theatres Friday, April 3.