Man of Her Dreams (1997)

Boring

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Blistering performances.

"Man of Her Dreams" (also known as "The Fiancé") is a 1997 made-for-television melodrama. The protagonist is a young woman who, in a moment of weakness when she believes her husband is being unfaithful, has a one-nighter with a seemingly thoughtful man named Walter. The unfaithful woman's name is Faith, who spends the balance of the film asking herself the question, "What have I got myself into?" It turns out that Walter is a psycho, who held his previous wife captive until she blew her brains out. Now, he will stop at nothing in order to tear Faith away from her husband Richard. In one of the oddest images of the film, Walter keeps intoning the word "gardenias." But it is never made clear how and why the gardenias figure in Walter's pathological thinking.The best line in the film comes when Faith, having recognized that Walter has destroyed the life of his previous wife, killed Faith's kind neighbor, butchered Faith's best friend, and nearly electrocuted her husband to death, casually informs Walter when he has her at gunpoint, "Sorry, wrong girl." Faith proves indeed that she is force to be reckoned with.

A happily married woman Faith (Lysette Anthony), has a one-night stand with Walter (handsome William R. Moses). Turns out he's a psycho and wants her to leave her husband (Patrick Cassidy). She rejects him and...guess what happens?Thoroughly predictable but not bad. The script is very well-written and all the actors give out good performances (even Cassidy whose part is criminally underwritten. Also, Wanda Acshna is fantastic as one of Faiths friends. Also the film wins extra points for keeping the violence down to a minimum.No great shakes but well done. An enjoyable time killer.

This movie is so empty and vacuous it's hard even to comment. "Man..."/"Fiance" falls into the suspense---you wish---psycho serial killer genre. Everything suffers from terminal malnutrition: the plot, the dialogue, the direction, the acting, the score, not to mention each of its two titles ("The Fiance"??? Really!). The actors are pros but have absolutely nothing to work with nor any apparent direction. The characters connect neither to each other nor to the plot, the bones of which have no meat on them and barely connect to each other. No effort is wasted on creating or building tension; when someone gets killed, it's a non-event.One minimal plus: a couple of slightly interesting outdoor locations. (Ha! Now you can leave or go back to sleep.)Pathetic!

This film was very good with much suspense through out. I do not understand why the movie has a 5.2 user rating. It was very entertaining and kept me at the edge of my seat. I saw this on the cable network, FX and for a Cable TV movie. this movie was better than most. It kept my attention and since I watched it late at night while laying on the couch at times and that I did not fall asleep that is quite an accomplishment. Although it is predictable and not quite in the same league as "What Lies Beneath", I would definitely recommend this movie to my friends and family.