Hypnotic
"Hypnotic" is better than Hpnotiq, but that doesn't mean it's good.
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After having reviewed the Jennifer Lopez Netflix vehicle “The Mother” yesterday (here), Alec’s week of Bennifer continues with the Robert Rodriguez-directed and Ben Affleck-fronted “Hypnotic” (now in theaters).
Affleck stars as Danny Rourke, a detective whose daughter Minnie (played at different ages by Hala Finley and Ionie Olivia Nieves) went missing from a playground within the past few years. Danny’s marriage to Viv (Kelly Frye) hit the skids after the girl’s disappearance and he’s seeing a therapist (Nikki Dixon) to help deal with his issues.
Danny’s partner Nicks (JD Pardo) is supportive of his colleague and is easing him back to the beat – that is until they receive a fateful call concerning a bank robbery. The men arrive on scene to find shadowy figure Dellrayne (aces character actor William Fichtner) orchestrating the heist. Dellrayne isn’t doing anything physically per se, but rather is having others do his bidding via hypnosis. Danny makes his way into the bank and retrieves the safe deposit box Dellrayne was targeting … inside it is a Polaroid of Minnie.
Danny seeks the assistance of another hynotic named Diana Cruz (Alice Braga) in getting answers regarding his daughter’s abduction. She in turn reaches out to fellow hypnotics River (Dayo Okeniyi) and Jeremiah (Jackie Earle Haley) for guidance.
Rodriguez was definitely one of my favorite filmmakers as a teenager alongside the likes of Sam Raimi, John Woo, Quentin Tarantino and Kevin Smith. I always admired that he made his breakthrough feature “El Mariachi” on a miniscule $7,000 budget and held so many different positions on his productions. In addition to directing he’d also often write, produce, edit, score, DP and serve as visual effects supervisor. This cat truly is a “Rebel Without a Crew.”
Rodriguez’s career has taken some interesting turns in the past coupla years. He’s done director-for-hire stints on the James Cameron-produced “Alita: Battle Angel” (a movie I dug more than most) and the mega-hit Disney+ series “The Mandalorian,” churned out another insufferable kiddie flick in the form of “We Can Be Heroes” (review here) and served as showrunner for “The Book of Boba Fett.”
“Hypnotic” feels like a bunch of random movies (among them “Firestarter” (1984 or 2022), “Shutter Island,” “Inception” and “Serenity” (the Matthew McConaughey vehicle wherein a kid creates a video game to watch his parents bone, not the Joss Whedon joint) jammed together into one confused movie.
It’s far too self-serious to jibe with the bulk of Rodriguez’s tongue-in-cheek filmography, but it’s in this self-seriousness that the picture becomes a hoot and a half. Rodriguez scripted alongside Max Borenstein, who’s had a hand in penning every installment of Warner Bros.’ MonsterVerse thus far and co-created HBO’s “Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty,” and the resulting product reads like “Christopher Nolan For Dummies.”
Affleck makes for a wooden but not entirely unappealing lead. (See Affleck’s own “Air” now on Prime Video for a far more engaged performance.) He and Braga have decent enough chemistry despite having to play a bunch of gobbledygook with complete sincerity. Fichtner seems to be having fun doing a more severe spin on his “Drive Angry” character. I could’ve gone for more Haley … that dude’s almost always the goods.
“Hypnotic” was released with little fanfare by fledgling distributor Ketchup Entertainment, which is probably why you haven’t heard of it. (They’re likely best-known for handling the rights to Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer spoof movies “Superfast!” and “The Starving Games” and the Jeremy Lin basketball doc “Linsanity.”) Even at a scant 92 minutes if “Hypnotic” were a hot dog it’d have a whole helluva lot more toppings than just ketchup. I’m talking mustard, relish, onions, sauerkraut, chili, cheese and jalapeño … the whole kitchen sink. It’s messy and you’ll likely have regrets after digestion, but it’s guiltily tasty going down.