Not so Fantastic Island (FANTASY ISLAND)

Fantasy Island (Spoilers)

Fantasy Island is a 2020 "supernatural horror" film about a group of 5 people who are brought to an island that not only knows your deepest desire, but will also allow you to live through it. The concept of this film comes from the 1977 television series of the same name and is to play as a prequel to that show (not that I'm gonna be watching it).

The beginning of the film has the 5 main characters arriving at the island and being greeted by the hotels workers. All of them have apparently won a contest and that is how they get to live out their fantasies on the inexplicable island. As they all settle down and start to get to know each other, they slowly share what they are hoping to experience whilst they are there.

Step brothers, Brax and J.D. seem to be in on sharing theirs and to put it simply, its living life as any frat boy does, a huge party with models, alcohol and recreational drugs. Pretty simple and basic fantasy for any young male American, I'm sure.

Patrick, a former police officer, his desire is to enlist into the military. He explains that he never enlisted because he promised his mother but he always wanted to to honour his late father, who died heroically saving his men from a grenade on mission to Venezuela  when he was a child. Again, this is pretty straight forward and surely doable for him to experience whilst on the island.

Melanie Cole seems to be the overly confident one to begin with and she tells Patrick that her desire is to make a bully, from her school years, life hell. She elaborates on the mental scarring that she sustained throughout life because of her and wants nothing more than to get a little revenge.

Last but not least we have Gwen Olsen, who doesn't actually tell anyone what she wants whilst she is there. She seems to be the only sceptic who is there as well. Its only when the islands "keeper" Mr Roarke (Michael Pena) interrogates her to get to the bottom of it all. Gwen explains that her biggest regret was turning down a proposal to her ex boyfriend because "she doesn't deserve happiness".

I'm not going to lie, at this present moment in the film, I was invested. I had picked up on certain quotes throughout that made me think about how the story was going to go.

Mr Roarke says on a number of occasions that "You can only have one fantasy per person and you MUST live out the fantasy to its natural conclusion". Which if you think about it logically, it must be impossible to leave until you die because otherwise the fantasy will never end.

As an example, if your fantasy was to become a millionaire, you get the million and spend it all. You are still in that fantasy because everything you have spent money on will still exist. So one fantasy per person... till it naturally ends. Yepp, give me some of that definitely.

From pretty much the get go, I felt that Michael Pena was going to be a huge anchor on this ship. By this I mean he doesn't exactly fit the "bad guy" character and it definitely showed throughout. Going from the lovable, overly chatty Luis in Ant-Man to this shady, riddle speaker for me, it didn't work.

So, everyone is playing out their fantasies. The brothers have just had the party of their life, Patrick has "enlisted" and is wandering the woods looking for his platoon, Melanie is in a basement with her high school bully strapped to a chair with controls to torture her and Gwen is very sceptically reliving the date in which she turned down the love of her life. At what point is everything going to go wrong? When are people going to start dying? Who is going to be the first to try and break the fantasy? 

Well it just so happens that even though Gwen doesn't believe that its all ACTUALLY happening, she still thinks that her boyfriend is acting, she says yes and then spends the night with him.

Patrick gets taken hostage by an american group of soldiers led by his dad who he thinks is just an actor, but no, its him.

The house in which the brothers are at gets raided by a gang and they get taken hostage over lost money and cocaine (insert Jake Peralta COCAINEEEEE here).

Which leaves Melanie, who at this point has realised that Sloane (high school bully) is not actually a hologram but its actually her. She has only noticed after she has sent a video of Sloane cheating on her husband to her husband and set an executioner upon her. 

I was still currently enjoying this film. Each persons story (except Gwen's) was interesting enough to keep me trying to figure out how all of this was going to come to fruition. No offence but Gwen's was just a casual romance story and I really didn't care. I'm watching a horror NOT a romance. However, hers was suddenly a lot more interesting when she yet again says "I don't deserve this". Which annoyed me because there was so much still not spoken about that I couldn't even guess as to what she was talking about.

Gwen then makes her way over to Mr Roarke and she requests a new fantasy. Now we are talking Gwen, give me information! He once again tells her that each guest is allowed ONE and only ONE fantasy. Shuts the door on her. So rather than taking that and carrying on, she asks Mr Roarkes personal assistant who at this point seems to have taken ill as she is coughing up blood (we do see earlier in the film that she gets a nosebleed out of nowhere).

It was here when I started thinking, its her fantasy, she has something to do with all of this and its taken a turn for the worse for her but as Gwen asks her for a new fantasy, it turns out you can reset what you want to live through, but she HAS to live it out.

Turns out Gwen's biggest regret wasn't turning the proposal down, she only said that because she was so sceptical about the island that she didn't think you would be able to rewrite the past. What she really wanted was to go back 6 years and help her friend and neighbour to get out of a fire that she had started from her flat below.

This was were things started to get interesting. As shes running to her flat, she runs passed Brax and J.D. going the other way. Not the present brothers, the two who were in the same block of flats as Gwen during the fire. She carries on to her room where she goes straight for her fire extinguisher but is then blocked by falling debris. Heading upstairs you can hear her neighbour calling for help, she tries to kick the door down with no luck, so she heads outside to get help. The police officer on duty is past Patrick, again, taken by surprise but she tries to convince him to help. With no luck she goes back to her flat looking for something to break his door down. He is still calling for help. I'm no expert but they say smoke is the bigger killer and if he can still confidently shout then he's immortal or something and just to back up my point she passes out within seconds. 

Well, Gwen's dead. Nah, just kidding, she gets dragged out of the smoke and the building back into the hotel by Mr Roarkes assistant. So, Gwen, Patrick, Brax and J.D. all have something in common, in that they were all at the flat when Nick (the neighbour) died. This was literally when I suspected that Melanie was going to be the instigator in all of this and she was going to be the reason they are all there.

The moment I lost interest in this film, and this is gonna sound weird, but was the moment I found out how the Island had its power. A magical stone in the heart of the Island. For me this was the easiest method they could have gone with and yes, it might have had something to do with the fact its based on a show from the 70s but its so lazy. A magic stone and let me guess, you destroy the stone and everything fixes itself. Yepp.

So skipping some boring details on how they all get to the heart which involves Melanie being one of the people taking them there. We are at the stone. We find out why Mr Roarke is there and what his goal is. He and his wife spent a long time searching for the "magic island" but she passed away before they found it. So his ongoing fantasy is keeping his wife alive. But the disturbing outcome is that she follows her life path over and over meaning she always falls ill and dies and then comes back at an earlier stage in her life. I mean come on, you can live out your deepest fantasy, why would it be for your wife to live the exact life she lived?! Grow up Pena. 

This is when we get the most basic horror film killing spree motive. Melanie wanted to avenge the death of Nick. She went on ONE date with him and clearly became obsessed. The second date was on the night of the fire and that's when she found out the names of his friends who didn't help (Brax and J.D.) the police officer on duty (Patrick) and the person caused the fire by leaving the kettle on the hob (Gwen). Alls I'm saying is, if Americans had actual kettles then this wouldn't have happened but no, they boil their water on the hob. However it does sound like a movie could start in England if somebody interfered with someones kettle. Imagine not being able to make a brew?! Anyway.

We've just been given the simple motive now for the simple solution. Everyone is allowed their own fantasy. Everyone who is their is because of Melanie's fantasy and they all lived their own inside of hers. Except for Sloane, who wasn't "invited" to the island, she was kidnapped to be tortured. Which means that she is allowed a fantasy of her own and all she has to do is drink the island water. Just so happens she has some. Mr Roarke (who's dying wife has basically told him that he has to intervene to save them) has decided that his own fantasy is selfish and tells Sloane what to do. She drinks the water and her fantasy is for Melanie and Nick (who we actually see throughout the film as a charred body but only glimpses) to be together forever. He then comes out of the well which is underneath the "magic stone" and pulls her under.

Now when I say I skipped some boring bits, I skipped the fact that there was a grenade that got brought into it from the house the step brothers were at. Patrick stopped the grenade getting thrown because its a grenade that kills his dad. His dad still dies and they keep the grenade with them because they always come in handy right? Well their plan to destroy the stone relies on that. 

So this grenade ends up being thrown into the middle of the group by Melanie and gives Patrick a reason to go out like his dad, by saving everyone and sacrificing himself. Its a good sentiment, just so unnecessary. It didn't make me think, wow what a hero. I just thought, they've lazily tried to finish your character arc, you didn't save Nick but you can save them. I'm bored. It's classic, go to, hero conclusion and I did nothing but shake my head at it.

The end. Basically. Mr Roarke tells the group as they're leaving that his place is still on the island even if his fantasy has came to its natural ending. Which always leaves it open for a sequel. Please no.

It has been 24 hours since I watched that film and initially I gave it a 6/10 but now after writing this I'm giving it a 4/10. I really liked the idea. The thought of an island that can let you live one fantasy that you want and obviously it had to lead on to everything going wrong. However, the individual routes they went down were so generically boring that I am surprised I stayed invested as long as I did. Really I should have known that it was going to be Melanie all along because she was the only one who had a sinister fantasy from the start. Everything was lazy and predictable. 

However, I will say that Lucy Hale as Melanie was a surprisingly good cast. She played the stereotypical obsessed girl character very well and she stood out over everyone else. Its just a shame that the story was so poor.

If I was to recommend a horror film to anyone, I would still suggest films produced by Blumhouse Productions, but I'd probably stay away from this film. 

Thank you for reading my first blog. I know its been about 12 years since I said I was gonna do one but currently sat in my 5th week of isolation due to Covid-19 has finally made me pull the laptop out and absolutely hate on a film. Could just be built up cabin fever frustration but seriously... this film disappointed me more than I could express.

Thanks again! 

Anth