Review: ‘One Hour Fantasy Girl’

Brandi will meet any man’s fantasy, as long as she stays dressed at least to her bra and underwear and the fantasy doesn’t include sex or kissing. Â  She is a woman trying to find her way in the world just as she is stepping into whatever depraved and socially disregarded actions her clientel can finds soothing. Â  This is the central character of Edgar Michael Bravo’s drama ‘One Hour Fantasy Girl.’ Â  It is a film that explores how finding yourself in another person’s desires while ignoring your own can create a harsh reality.

Bravo is a filmmaker who has been writing, directing, and editing films for the better part of two decades, and his experience is fleshed out in the way ‘One Hour Fantasy Girl’ is presented. Â  The visual style of Brandi’s world is that of a dream-state, almost surreal in its lighting and composition. Â  The shots Bravo composes are quite beautiful, in fact, and, in the latter part of the film, when the story seems to miss its mark, you can always find solstice that everything will look nice.

What Bravo sets up is an emotional look at one woman and the obstacles she must go through in order to find her own fantasy life. Â  We get very little of Brandi’s backstory in the early parts of the film, and this would have been a nice touch had it stuck with the ambiguity throughout. Â  Unfortunately, we get too many quick flashes of a life before, and, piecing what takes place before the story begins, it’s nothing original.

Yet, for more than the first half of the film, we are offered a nice study on human character. Â  Everything seems to be in order. Â  Unfortunately, somewhere around the 50-minute mark, Bravo feels he has to add another level to Brandi’s story. Â  The films falls into the mistake that it has to go in unsuspecting directions. Â  Certain choices made come off as ridiculous and eye rolling. Â  By the time the film delves into violence and online poker, it loses its audience completely.

The film’s score by Nima Fakhrara is mesmerizing and haunting, yet, strangely, it never feels out of place. Â  Brandi is sleep deprived despite the “soothing” music and meditations her business partner/pimp sets for her.

“It gets easier. Â  I swear,” says the pimp in the film’s opening line of dialogue. Â  This is easy for him to say when he can sit in his car and drown the world out with music and incense while Brandi works.

The world Brandi lives in seems to be moving as such, sluggish and oddly distant. Â  The actress behind Brandi, Kelly-Ann Tursi, comes off like Justine Bateman by way of Prozac. Â  She is a fine actress, and a certain breakdown scene is incredibly believable. Â  This particular scene hints at the actress Tursi can potentially become given more experience in front of the camera.

The rest of the acting ranges from wholly forgettable to downright bad. Â  Paul D. Nguyn as Brandi’s “partner” and Jon Morgan Woodward as a client with a much deeper purpose late in the film do a fine job with what they are given. Â

Joe Luckay as Bobby, a 20-something who appears to be looking for something more than just a nameless and faceless relationship is less than satisfying. Â  Oftentimes he appears to be saying lines of dialogue as opposed to playing the character written. Â  When we first see Bobby, we aren’t sure if he is comic relief or an annoyance amidst the drama. Â  Part of this is the way he is written, but much of it is Luckay’s presence.

‘One Hour Fantasy Girl’ is a film with first-rate moments and highly respectable elements. Â  Fakhrara’s score is near incredible. Â  Bravo’s directing style is top-notch, but it might be a good idea for him to step back from the page helm someone else’s screenplay next time. Â  This film has deep-seeded ideas and a lot in the execution going for it, but, in the end, it misses the mark in its writing so much that everything else seems trivial in comparison.

Overall: 2.5 stars out of 5