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Is Paul Verhoeven an incurable pervert or what? The Dutch
director best known for the allegedly raunchy Basic Instinct and stunningly
tacky Showgirls, here updates the cinematic chestnut of a scientist making
himself invisible, only to use this wondrous advance for little more than
spying on, ahem, naked ladies. Erm, hello?
Thankfully, Verhoeven and screenwriter Andrew Marlowe realise that juvenile voyeurism can't sustain an entire movie outside the soft porn genre, spending only the first reel rummaging in the metaphorical underwear drawer. Then, their maverick scientist anti-hero Sebastian Caine (Bacon), apparently cut adrift from all moral moorings by his invisibility, turns evil, and starts murdering his colleagues. Why? Fuck knows, but in the end, only Caine's ex-girlfriend Linda (Shue) is left to smash his see-through head in after a brilliantly mental Alien-meets-The Fly bloodbath.
Still, once you accept that Hollow Man is pure pumped-up
hokum, you can enjoy it for precisely what it is: a camp, gory, demented
stalk'n'slash sci-thriller with pseudo-philosophical ideas above its station
and stunning effects. And the visuals are the true stars here - especially
the invisibility drug, which erases human bodies layer by layer, peeling
away blood vessels and internal organs with precise anatomical accuracy.
A great rock'n'roll B-movie, then, touched by the deranged and slightly
sleazy hand of Verhoeven.
6/10