Soulless
Hollow Man, the latest offering from Paul Verhoeven
(Robocop, Total Recall), showcases the director's
usual mix of violence, eye-popping visual effects, and
gore, resulting in a cinematic exploration of the
wonders and horrors (mainly horrors) of invisibility.
If you recall the brutal slaying of the corporate
executive by the ED-209 in Robocop (even after it
was ordered to be trimmed by the MPAA due to its
excessive violence) or Arnold Schwarzenegger's use of
a corpse to shield against a shower of bullets in
Total Recall, you have a fairly good notion of the
graphic nature of Verhoeven's oeuvre, and what to
expect from Hollow Man.
The movie's opening scene, in which a lab rat meets
its end in the jaws of an invisible animal, makes
clear that the audience will be confronting the dark
side of its subject matter: turning a human being
invisible. But before the blood really spills, the
movie introduces Sebastian Caine (Kevin Bacon), a
brilliant and cocky scientist, as well as his two main
assistants, his ex-girlfriend Linda McKay (Elisabeth
Shue) and her current boyfriend Matt Kensington (James
Brolin) — though he and Linda are hiding their
relationship from Sebastian, fearing his jealous
response.
It turns out that they are right to be afraid. But
because their initial concern establishes that
Sebastian is from the start something of a menace, he
has nowhere to go as a character. The film presents
everyone around Sebastian — Matt and Linda and the
rest of the scientific team — simply and
sympathetically. Linda and Matt are a hard-working,
loving couple, and the subordinate staff appear to be
decent folks who are dedicated to the project. Nothing
that these characters do throughout the rest of the
film causes us to view them any differently. Sebastian
is another issue. Early scenes show his egoism (when
computer technician Frank Chase [Joey Slotnick]
jokingly refers to himself as "God," Sebastian
corrects him by saying, "You're not God. I am"), his
insensitivity (Sebastian casually orders that a test
animal be cut up, purposefully irritating veterinarian
Sarah Kennedy [Kim Dickens]), and his lack of ethics
(Sebastian decides to hide the team's success from
their financial backers, the Pentagon, so that he
might continue the project on his own).
These various instances don't exhibit Sebastian as a
villain, but neither do they endear him to the
audience. Instead, they prime the viewer to despise
him later on, after the experiment enters "Phase 3,"
when he tests the invisibility serum on a human, that
is, himself. When he and the team are unable to
reverse the effect and he's stuck in a transparent
state indefinitely, Sebastian becomes not just mean,
but insane.
Hollow Man asks the question "What would you do if
no one could see you?" But a better question, in
Sebastian's case, might be, "What would you do if you
were a narcissistic misogynist and no one could see
you?" The answer is: sexually harass your
ex-girlfriend, ogle and assault your attractive
neighbor, threaten and murder your staff members, and
even kill a poor little puppy dog simply because it
won't stop barking.
Sebastian's evil behavior ends up delivering little
more than shock value. He experiences no great moral
dilemma, other than a brief conflict in which he
struggles with the implications of sneaking into his
neighbor's apartment to get a better look at her.
Basically, he progresses from merely unpleasant to
homicidal without any detailing of his psychological
shift. I was left with many questions: Does Sebastian
realize that he is a monster? Does he recognize that
his treatment of his neighbor and Linda is demeaning
and repulsive? Does he does he want to return to
visibility or does he want to use his newfound power
for some kind of malevolent master plan?
Verhoeven and screenwriter Andrew V. Marlowe seem more
concerned with thrilling the audience than in
exploring any of these questions or delving into the
quandary of "invisibility ethics" — the conflict
between what one can do and what one should do
under extraordinary circumstances. Sebastian
eventually traps his staff in the research compound
and attempts to snuff them by crowbar, sulfuric acid,
strangulation, and other devious means. The effects
are awe-inspiring (watching an invisible man drown one
of his victims in a pool is admittedly enjoyable), but
leave viewers separated from Sebastian and his
experience.
This might not be a problem if Linda turned out to be
a more compelling character, but the film invests
little emotion in either her or Matt. When Linda
shifts into full-on Sigourney Weaver mode, bandaging
up Matt's wounds and hunting down Mr. Invisible with a
homemade flamethrower — followed by the requisite
false ending, it becomes evident just how empty
Hollow Man really is. Even given her tremendous
courage and spunk, Linda is never much more than a
good-hearted character who becomes the hero in order
to bring the plot to a "satisfying" conclusion, in
which the villain gets his just desserts.
And so, we are left without a compelling or empathetic
central character. If Verhoeven had attempted to weave
more humanity, along with something of an exploration
of the moral dilemmas associated with Sebastian's
invisibility — similar to the ways he entwined themes
of identity, violence, and governance into Robocop
and Total Recall, respectively, the result might
have posed a more substantial "what if?" dilemma. As
it is, Hollow Man is a brutal thriller with
diverting special effects. But it lacks a soul.
