(2023) Hypnotic - A Movie with Interesting Plot and Some Mind Bending Part which Sadly not Explored Enough

After seeing the trailer to this movie multiple times in the theaters, I was quite intrigued and interested in seeing it. But it took a while till it's finally released in certain cinema chain in Indonesia three days ago. Anyway last night I gave it a try by myself as my wife was feeling too tired. Well, let us get into it.

Brief Story Line

Danny Rourke (Ben Affleck - The Flash, Deep Water etc) was a police detective who had traumatic experience when his young daughter Minnie was kidnapped and never found for years. After being called up for a possible crime in a bank by his partner Nicks (J. D. Pardo - The Terminal List TV series etc), both of them decided to do a stakeout. When Rourke saw a mysterious man (William Fichtner - Prison Break TV series, Armageddon etc), he immediately suspected he was the culprit which turned out to be true. 

His investigation led Rourke to a fortune teller named Diana (Alice Braga - The Suicide Squad, Queen of the South TV series etc) who seemed to know a lot about the mystery man with his special ability to do hypnotic on people. And soon they would be caught up in a much bigger mystery that might be linked to the kidnapping of Minnie.

So how would the story conclude? You can find them all in this movie.

End of Brief Story Line

OK, when I started watching this movie, most of the early part was already shown in the trailer which made me wonder if I should stop watching movie trailers as it revealed too much detail of the film. After almost half of the movie, I finally saw something new and made it more exciting. And then came the most shocking twist of them all which I did not see coming. It was a major surprise for me and I think was what the movie makers were hoping for when they made this. From that moment on, I was able to appreciate the film better.

I knew that this one was directed by Robert Rodriguez (Alita: Battle Angel, Sin City etc) whose style was quite distinct from other directors and based on screenplay written by him and Max Borenstein (writer of some Godzilla and Kong movies of the monsterverse). Probably Rodriguez name was what made me interested, including the plot of hypnotic being used for crimes. Sadly though, I personally felt the mind bending part was shown a bit too late. Probably if it was shown earlier, it might be more entertaining. I understand that critics were mixed on the film, but the worst part was the poor audience reception as could be seen in the bad box office performance. 

The cast somehow did not seem convincing either. Not sure why, but I felt Ben Affleck was not too serious playing this role with the lack of expression. Alice Braga was better and William Ficthner doing what he did best as a villain. There were also additional support cast such as Dayo Okeniyi (Shades of Blue TV series etc), Jeff Fahey (Machete etc), Zane Holtz (From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series etc) and few others. However, they appeared in such minor capacity that they did not leave any room to impress.

The film's duration was too short too with only 94 minutes including closing credit. As I said, if the focus was on the mind bending part and they showed it earlier with longer time to explore, there is possibility it would have greater impact. But then again it was just my opinion. Oh there was mid end credit scene which did not surprise me and I think did not make the movie better.

Overall I felt the movie could have been better in certain areas. Few of the action scene was quite OK though not the spectacular kind. The shocking twist was the best part but the ending was not too great. I also like the plot in general, unfortunately it was not explored enough. In the end, it was a film that I think would be easily forgotten except for that plot twist. So if you want to give this a try, just beware that you might feel it to be very mediocre and not memorable.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3 out of 5 stars