Hollow Man (2000)
Starring: Kevin Bacon, Elisabeth Shue, Josh Brolin
Director: Paul Verhoeven
Synopsis: Verhoeven's update of the the invisible man theme disappoints
Reviewed by: Ali Khan

The story is familiar enough - Scientist Sebastian Caine, (Kevin Bacon) along with his research team, discovers the formula for human invisibility. He proceeds to inject himself and duly 'disappears. Unfortunately, the invisibility process is the easy part. It's the reversion - making people visible again - where problems start occurring - that along with the fact that Caine starts enjoying himself a bit too much in his new unseen mode.

Paul Verhoeven had a string of early successes - the well mounted Total Recall, the pulsating Robocop and even the trashy but enjoyable Basic Instinct. Things started going wrong with the laughable Showgirls and the disappointing Starship Troopers. Both bombed at the box office. Hollow Man, it was hoped, would provide Verhoeven with the material to rediscover his obvious talent.

Unfortunately, while the film starts promisingly it deteriorates steadily until reaching a shockingly mediocre climax. For the first twenty minutes Hollow Man is deceptively enjoyable. The special effects are genuinely eye popping and the reversion of the invisible ape to its visible mode - layer-by-layer, tissue-by-tissue, bone-by-bone - is by far and away the best part of the movie. Following this, Verhoeven introduces a certain degree of uneasiness into the film mainly through Bacon's solid performance and also by managing to transfer to the audience the feeling of unease that comes from knowing the power that an 'invisible' person could wield.

Unfortunately, this tension dissipates quickly as Verhoeven concentrates increasingly on special effects and on making Bacon's character fulfil his ultimate voyeuristic fantasies instead of focussing on the effect that his condition has on his state of mind. As a result, his descent from ambitious, driven genius into crazed mass murderer is utterly unconvincing. While this means that there are a few good effect driven scenes, on the whole the film lacks any real tension. The film rapidly deteriorates until it reaches its most unimpressive, blood-spattered finale.

For a man whose films have often been laced with sharp, satirical humour, wonderful effects and stylish action, Hollow Man is a shockingly mediocre effort. At least they got the name right - its about as hollow as they come.