In short: Hypnotic (2023)

Police detective Danny Rourke (Ben Affleck) stumbles upon a very curious case: a sinister looking gentleman (William Fichtner) somehow convinces random civilians into helping him commit complicated and suicidal robberies. Even more curious: all of this seems somehow connected to the kidnapping of Rourke’s little daughter by another random stranger some time ago.

Before Rourke knows it, he is teaming up with a backstreet hypnotist (Alice Braga) and starts following the trail of a weird conspiracy surrounding an operation of government mind controllers with a deep love for red blazers.

Clearly, Robert Rodriguez didn’t go into this trying to make your bog standard contemporary action thriller but mixes it up with the traditions of the 70s paranoid thriller, as well as some X-Men style not quite superhero psi stuff. In the film’s good moments, this works out rather well. Particularly early on, before the film starts to explain way too much, Rodriguez regularly reaches an un-real and somewhat nightmarish mood of paranoia – the culmination here is certainly the scene in the police station where our hero gets in trouble with his partner, though there is also a really nice bit where Rourke finds himself mind-whammied into a murder attempt.

The more standard big budget action thriller elements never work out quite as well: the action is – atypical for Rodriguez – more competent than great, and the plot never quite has the drive it should have. On the other hand, Hypnotic pulls off its two big twists rather well, including a pretty clever sequence of reveals too fun to spoil here. I can take or leave the final one, however.

I do believe Hypnotic’s main problem is its lead actor. Affleck’s unwillingness or inability to express any human emotion beyond indigestion is of course legend by now, but it’s poison for any emotional effect the film should have on its audience. On paper, Rourke goes through a psychological and physical wringer, and it should be easy to make us sympathize with him and his plight, perhaps admire his gumption. Alas, Affleck doesn’t express any of this, leaving a vacuum where Hypnotic’s emotional heart should be.

That the film stays watchable throughout is a little wonder; though the kind of wonder that makes me particularly wistful for a better casting decision.