‘Fantasy Life’ Supplies a Stirring and Welcome Cinematic Return for Amanda Peet

What do you get if you take Woody Allen’s neurotic New Yorkers and comic romantic entanglements and update them to reflect society’s updated views on mental health, May-December relationships, and more? The diverting new film “Fantasy Life” provides a sensitively amusing answer to that question with its look at a youngish nerdy guy and his association with a middle-aged actress and her family. Premiering this Friday in New York theaters, before opening nationwide next weekend, the movie is not only entertaining but provides a wonderful showcase for the actress Amanda Peet, an always engaging yet often underappreciated performer who, after a decade of TV work, is appearing in her first film since 2015. As Dianne, an aging actress going through depression, marital trouble, and a career drought, Ms. Peet draws on elements in her own career and her adroit talent in melding the comic, dramatic, and sympathetic to create a sharp portrayal of feminine midlife crisis. The actress is in the news because of her recent essay in The New Yorker revealing her treatment for breast cancer and the film therefore stands as a testament to her resilience in the face of disease and trying personal times.The comedy drama marks the directorial feature film debut of actor Matthew Shear, who also wrote the screenplay and stars as Sam, the sweet but slightly schlubby guy who falls for a married woman. His gifts as a filmmaker are apparent in the humorous, at times punchy dialogue, and in his ability to allow key scenes to breathe with changing emotions and tones over several minutes, mirroring the uncertain thoughts of its protagonists and the flow of everyday interactions. As an actor, Mr. Shear embodies Sam with an honesty, vulnerability, and jittery energy indicative of personal experience with mental health struggles, which he has acknowledged in interviews. The film’s greatest strengths, though, may lie in his storytelling perception and actorly consideration, and how he ultimately crafted it around Ms. Peet’s character rather than his own, less dynamic one.Structured via the seasons in a year of its characters lives, the plot begins one fall as Sam, a paralegal, is let go from his firm and is subsequently hired to babysit the children of Dianne and husband David (a suitably obnoxious Alessandro Nivola). As the seasons progress, Sam becomes further enmeshed in the couple’s family as he continues to work as their sitter and all-round helper. This outline contains a potent comic kernel — the “manny” — that is only fleetingly explored, with Mr. Shear more interested in how Dianne and Sam navigate their respective depressions and growing intimacy, and how these developments affect others. Leveraging an elegant narrative economy and naturalistic performances instead of exposition and clear character motivation, the writer-director sculpts his film primarily through multiple extended scenes, each filled with tension and humor. Comedy, in particular, etches the dramatic weight of the subject matter into higher relief, such as in an early scene when Sam sees his shrink and admits to internalized anti-Semitism only to have the doctor make light of it. That this character is played by Judd Hirsch, who also played a psychiatrist in “Ordinary People,” makes the levity all the more geshmak.New York Jewish identity is both a direct and subtle theme running throughout the picture, with the cast made up of many Jewish actors, some of them native New Yorkers, such as Ms. Peet, Mr. Shear, and Mr. Hirsch. Much like in Woody Allen’s films, Jewish-style comedic beats are applied, as is physical comedy, observational drollery, and toilet humor. Also similar to Mr. Allen is the motif of therapy, though Mr. Shear integrates psychological struggles and treatment more realistically.The script broaches other serious subjects, including the Holocaust, President Trump, wealth, and privilege. An amazing scene near the end sees Dianne admit to her psychiatrist of feeling like a victim despite her life’s abundant advantages and pleasures, and it’s a devastating depiction of how anxiety and self-loathing affect even the very beautiful and most fortunate. Earlier moments in which she exhibits self-doubt, poise, narcissism, and recklessness, particularly in her relationship with Sam, induce a complicated mix of empathy, goodwill, and dislike for the character, and speak to Ms. Peet’s skillful balancing of Dianne’s different moods and motivations, as well as that of the film. Coming in at less than an hour and a half, the movie’s portrait of two depressed individuals finding brief solace in each other’s company proves, well, all too brief, with one wishing to spend a bit more time with the pair and their friends and family. Still, the story ends with a lovely scene in a New York diner, cementing its status as a heartwarming gem and Mr. Shear’s successful start as a director.

‘Fantasy Life’ Supplies a Stirring and Welcome Cinematic Return for Amanda Peet

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