A Futuristic Beauty Pageant Not Like Any Other

Bruce Von Stiers

About 170 years from now, in the year 2195, women rule the world. Men are mostly no more than playthings, to be objectified. Men only seek to become married. An alien race, the Anteriyan's, invaded Earth, and made it seemingly better. Now called the New Earth, it was divided into districts. Each district is ruled by corporate conglomerates.

As new planets are discovered, they are considered luxury real estate. And certain women own many planets along with other wealth.

There is a beauty pageant, Victor's Angels, Mr. World. It is the most anticipated event of all time. Only, instead of young and beautiful women, the contestants are men.

This is the beginning of a futuristic comedy film, Galaxy 360: A Woman's Playground. The film is indeed a comedy but has biting satire and a sliver or two of drama as well.

Illumina is the host and lead judge of the beauty pageant. Through an introduction by the pageant's MC and on screen information, we learn about Illumina's net worth, the number of divorces she's had, the number of cheating scandals she's been in and the number of men she's been with. As the other judges are introduced, their information is listed also.

The other judges are Baroness Waldorf III, Clement Huntington and Dalialah Staganoff. Each judge has their own wealth and prominence. Later, a final judge is revealed. It is a man, a former winner of the pageant.

From there, the film introduces each contestant. A quick interview is done with a contestant and then their talent, monetary value, their relationship status and other information is provided. These guys are bizarrely funny. An exercise fanatic, a poet, an empath and a guy whose entry into the pageant was by mistake are but a few of the zany characterizations of the contestants.

There is a boot camp for the contestants that is as funny as it is unusual. And there are a bunch of commercials and corporate tie-ins highlighted during the various pageant segments. One scene has the contestants putting a piece of tape on their mouths. That is followed by an onscreen sales pitch for the vendor for pieces of tape, Silence Tape, to cover people's mouths. This was done to make it seem like more of an actual beauty pageant. But, as I alluded to earlier, the emphasis is on corporate entities. Because it seems that the entire world is now run by corporations. Forbearance of our true future?

Things that the contestants will be rated on include sexy demeanor, smile ability, buttock evenness and tongue flexibility. And the least rated ability seems to be talent. Apparently, the contestants don't need to have any other capabilities other than being a good, subservient mate. While maybe not quite trophy husband material, the contestants do have certain things going for themselves.

While the training, the boot camp and the competition prep is going on, Illumina has a little thing going on with the contestant from District 12.

Some of the scenes with the contestants interacting with each other remind me of other reality television programs. Their squabbling has kind of a Real Housewives vibe and Illumina's individual training with contestants has a behind the scenes dance competition vibe as well.

At the final stages of the competition, the other judges take Illumina to task for “flicking” several of the contestants. They feel that makes her too biased and not able to render a proper selection vote for the pageant. But she points out to them that her activities, which have millions of views, are making money for them. And that they all are without commitments to men and are really just whores.

Anna Fishbeyn played Illumina. She also wrote screenplay for the film and directed it. Invisible Alice and The Love Bathroom are just but two of the films that Anna's previously directed and wrote screenplays for.

Squeaky Moore played the Baroness. Besides appearing in films and an episode of Elementary, Squeaky is also a casting director. Lauren LoGiudice played Clement. She appeared in an episode of Veep and films such as Hayride To Hell and The Porn Radio Show. Athena Michaelides played Dalialah. She co-starred on stage in Becky's New Car and played lead roles in the films Devotion and Omma. David R. Nash played Kyle, the token male on the judging panel. He was on Blue Bloods for a couple of episodes and a recurring role on Crazy Town.

Lawrence E. Sturdivant Jr. played contestant District 12. He appeared in Plastic French and Vex. Brennan Lowery played the contestant District 5, a kind of laid-back hippie type. He's appeared in several shows and co-starred in films like Four Bottles. Justin C. Schilling was District 3, a not quite macho, but trying to be, contestant. Aside from films, he appeared in an episode of Blue Bloods and had a recurring role on Great Kills. Conder Shou was District 20. He starred in the short films Cowboy Joe and Who Can Predict What Will Move You.

Other actors playing contestants from various Earth districts were Jesse Sneddon, Ryan Bobila, Ryan Santiago and Hassan Farrow.

Actors who had supporting roles in the film were Reed Butts, Sadjah Campbell, Madison Middleton, Eliana Kushner, Tamrian Kushner and Margarita Fishbeyn.

The cinematographer for the film was Bela Attila Kovacs. Some of his work as cinematographer include the short films The Visit, F Therapy and The Movie Star. The assistant director as Ashley Monique George. She's been a producer for a lot of films and an assistant director for a bunch more. Her films include Sometimes, Forever, Diabla and Slush.

One thing to know about this film is that the original version was done a few years ago. It was never officially released but had private showings and was included at a few film industry events. It screened at Cannes film event, was a finalist for a Sundance film event and was an official selection for the Big Apple Film Festival. This last event garnered Anna Fishbeyn recognition as a female filmmaker.

As things went along, Anna decided to enhance the film, giving it a truer sci-fi world to be depicted in. During the pandemic, she learned Adobe Premiere and added some fantastic looking special effects for a really cool sci-fi realm. Anna also learned how to splice videos together to create some interesting scenes.

Galaxy 360: A Woman's Playground is a really appealing and funny comedy film. It takes the whole beauty pageant realm and flips it upside down. Men in this future are objectified as much or more than women are in today's world. With very comedic results. And the film shows that corporate greed shows no boundaries as almost every element in the beauty pageant has some kind of corporate tie-in.

But the film is not all fun. The final few minutes of the film have an actual, true-to-life, message from Anna Fishbeyn. It takes all of the silliness, the over-the-top sensationalism and objectifying of men in the film and turns it on it's head. It is a very strong message that speaks to what women have to endure, even in today's modern culture.

Galaxy 360: A Woman's Playground is still being shown at media and industry events along with film festivals. It is slated to be available on selected streaming services a little later this year.

MOVEMENT360.TV is a new streaming platform that has been developed by Anna Fishbeyn. It is dedicated to innovative, original content that seeks to empower and illuminate new possibilities. You can explore Galaxy 360 clips, behind the scenes and selected trailers. Here is a link for the film's official trailer. https://movement360.tv/watch-video/?video_id=e96969c0-1d8a-40d5-9f50-36339e139bec&cat_id=f0231b37-c032-4957-9391-df59f3bb454d&title=GALAXY%20360%20OFFICIAL%20TRAILER&is_video=1

Back to the BVS Reviews Main Menu

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _

© 2025 Bruce E Von Stiers