FANTASY LIFE -- A Realistic Look at Living with Anxiety

Review by Steve Barton II

Mental health is a topic that’s often mishandled in the world of film and television. You have some cases where a mental illness is seen as a death sentence or a detrimental character flaw or it’s almost offensively celebrated like a superpower. While the ends of the spectrum aren’t equal, both are wrong. Fantasy Life takes a fresh look at how the average person deals with mental illness in their day-to-day life and the struggles that come with it. Fantasy Life follows Sam (Matthew Shear) as a mentally ill, failed law student who obtains a babysitting job from his therapist to babysit their grandchildren. While caring for the children, Sam also falls for their married mother, Dianne (Amanda Peet) who is going through her own mental health struggles and they find solace in one another.

The biggest compliment to give Fantasy Life is its handling of mental health and its healthy depiction. Unlike blockbuster movies like Joker, Matthew Shear shows anxiety and depression from a realistic perspective. With his own character, he shows the debilitating effects of panic attacks and while they may look funny to onlookers, the individual is suffering. Sam’s struggles are relatable to many young adults who feel lost while comparing themselves to their peers and the life benchmarks that they’re miles behind. From Amanda Peet’s character, we see her struggling with being middle-aged as an actor and being aged out of her profession. This role for Amanda may serve as her comeback role because her career has played out similar to Dianne’s and her extra effort is seen on the screen. The co-dependency that blossoms into a romance that these two lost characters find one another is cute, but ultimately unhealthy and wrong.

While it is a nice portrayal of mental illness, its visual style leaves much to be desired. Fantasy Life doesn’t make much of an effort to do anything special or memorable with the camera and the sets are mostly just New York City and suburbs. Rom-coms like When Harry Went Sally and countless others have done more with the beautiful city, but the lower budget must be considered here too. The romance plot does pull away the focus on mental health, but their relationship also shows just how delusional they can become. 

In the end, Fantasy Life is a nice story about a lost man who is desperate to find his place in this giant world. Matthew Shear shows some promise in the director’s chair and wrote a personal tale that many people will find compelling and relatable. He and Amanda Peet are incredible as the leads and the supporting cast with Andrea Martin, Holland Taylor, Bob Balaban and the iconic Judd Hirsch rounded it out completely. If you feel lost and alone on your mental health journey and need a movie to comfort you, take a chance on Fantasy Life.

Fantasy Life is playing in theaters starting April 3rd. 

Rating: 3.5/5