My review was written in November 1981 after a Times Square screening:
Filmed in Greece in 1973 as "And Once Upon a Time", this "Fantasies" is the belated release of John and Bo Derek's first collaboration, a modern romantic fable of unbearable naivete. Inane script and absence of sex scenes in this travelog will alienate the team's current fans.
Unworkable premise has young captain Damir (Peter Hooten) and his sister Anastasia (Bo Derek) returning to their Greek island home to mobilize the peasant population to refurbishing the place as a popular tourist trap. Opening reels present a sex tease of incest as Anastasia becomes aware (at 16!) she is a woman and so does her brother. However, the wise local femme mayor (Anna Alexiadis) informs us they were foundlings up separate families brought up as brother and sister, causing fear of incest to switch to sparring romance.
Amidst boring footage of the island, sea and the peasants, emerges the picture's howler of a subplot. It turns out that "Fantasies" is actually a story of Anastasia's bathing habits! In her first scene she fantasizes bathing in a tub in a store window and then complains for several reels to Damir about bathing in the ocean, an activity he revels in. Latter half of the pic has him secretly digging up a huge stone artifact among the ruins, and incredibly, at film's finale he marries her in front of the populace and presents her with the artifact, an ancient bathtub. As their hands embrace during the ceremony, lenser John Derek racks the focus to reveal a vast ship full of tourists arriving in the harbor, ready to be fleeced.
This silly exercise looks and plays eight years later about the same as the duo's eight years after "Tarzan, the Ape Man" -hundreds of adoring closeups of Bo looking innocent, usually with a finger in her mouth; inane baby-talk dialog; silhouetted posing of characters against landscapes; and even stuttering slow-motion photography. Derek even writes in an irrelevant role of a still photographer visiting the island, so he can present an endless montage of Bo posing in various costumes.
Other than some fleeting nudity, there's not much to exploit here. Bo Derek at age 16 is a beauty, differing from her later incarnations mainly in her dark brown tresses, and offering no hint of acting ability. Peter Hooten is overbearing as her protector, with post-synched dialog, neutralizing the effect of the Greek supporting cast. Despite some pleasant folk motifs, the music score is old-fashioned, sporting repeated ballads voiced over lyrical sequences in the '60s manner.
Title "Fantasies" is a misnomer, as only a couple of meek daydreams are included. All told, a curio somewhere between a home movie and professional filmmaking.
