I very much wanted to like Hollow Man, and to some extent I did. Paul Verhoeven is a talented director (not counting Showgirls) but unfortunately this film is firmly entrenched in the "miss" column. This is frustrating in that he had a pretty excellent movie that simply derails during the last half hour. Kevin Bacon did an admirable job as the cocky, arrogant yet brilliant scientist who slowly over the course of the film becomes affected by his invisibility in ways he couldn't have predicted. My main problem with Hollow Man (and there were several, all within the last 30 minutes) is how utterly absurd the film becomes. Here we have a team of (assumed) incredibly brilliant scientists who huddle like frightened school children when the invisible Bacon becomes deranged and begins killing. Its as if they had no idea it was going to come to this, despite the fact that earlier Bacon sexually assaults a colleague, escapes from the lab, covers it up and lies about it, and kills a lab dog with his bare hands. A normal person, let alone an intelligent scientist, would have pulled the plug long before it got to this point. The scientists are utterly stupid toward the end of the film. They have many resources available, from infrared glasses to make him visible, to tranquilizers, that they rarely if ever used. They run around blindly bumping into one another while never really using the tools available to them. Further, the protagonist is burned with steam and engulfed in flames from a flamethrower (to the point where EVERY stitch of clothing is burned off), hit in the head with a crowbar and electrocuted, yet still manages to walk about unscathed to cause more harm. I am NOT an idiot, yet the ending of the film treats me as one. Verhoeven, as a filmmaker, should have demanded a rewrite of the script's end. A disappointing movie in that for the first 1.5 hours, this was a solid 8 (possibly a 9), and the last 30 minutes is a 1. Final review: 6. I would recommend seeing it if for nothing else the astounding special effects and a rather good performance by Kevin Bacon as a mad scientist.
Review of Hollow Man
