Fantasy Island '06

Famed television producer Aaron Spelling passed away this weekend. He will be remembered as the most prolific producer in television history. Just reading through the names of programs Spelling created (The Love Boat, Dynasty, 90210...) has been shown to kill brain cells. Singular among Spelling's vast canon of stupid shows is Fantasy Island. Like a blinding white diner jacket, Fantasy Island stands alone as his most implausible creation.

A new movie entitled Fantasy Island '06: Final Fantasy, due to be released this fall, attempts to catch up with the original show's main characters, Mr. Rourke and Tattoo, in the present day. Reprising the lead role is none other than Sir Anthony Hopkins. Playing the part of ethnic man-gnome, Tattoo, is fabulous newcomer Virginia Madsen of Sideways fame.

The movie opens to Rourke and Tattoo filming a series of shoddy infomercials to air on late night television in between magic hair loss pills and ads for phone-sex. Their once stellar reputation has all but been demolished in the wake of lawsuits over the often disturbing nature of fantasies recently experienced on the Island: One plaintif recounts a defective fantasy in which his deceased father came back to life as an aerobics instructor prone to making light of the homeless. Another tells of a champion downhill skiing fantasy in which she suffered through hours of uncontrolable urinating in her snow suit. Finally, soaking and cold, the poor woman had no choice but to compete in her race while hooked to a catheter. She fnished last.

Members of Mr. Rourke's staff had been warning their beloved leader about the Island's diminishing reserves of Montalbanaloid Crystals-- the essential element in producing Fantasy Island fantasies--for years. Crippled by bad investment decisions, Rourke chose to ignore their warnings and press on with his work--and now it may be too late...

Early in the film, in a scene that young children are discouraged from viewing, Rourke (Hopkins) is shown extracting what is revealed later to be adrenal fluid from Tattoo's magical gnome-glands. The fluid is a powerful supplement which allows Rourke to conserve more of the Montalbanaloid Crystals and continue, reluctantly, to run his business and make child support payments to his many ex-wives. The unnatural mix of mystical body fluids and powerful space crystals results in the defective fantasies as well as the ultimate demise of Mr.Rourke and Fantasy Island.

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Extracting the fluid leaves Tattoo (Madsen) in weakened state; with spongy, grey skin, and only a few wispy hairs atop his head. In an Oscar worthy performance, Virginia Madsen spends the entire second half of the film shivering in a tool shed, muttering the show's famous catch phrase, "de-plane boss...de-plane." to no one.