PLOT SUMMARY: Jenn begins going to Dr Collin Meade for therapy not realizing he has nefarious intentions for her.
I've come to realise that more often than not, good direction can turn a film into a great viewing experience and a box office success.
Take any story, clichéd as it may be, and execute it properly and the movie will be a hit.
However, shoddy direction will do the opposite. The story could be compelling, the cast could be great but if the direction is off then the story could look ridiculous, the actors would appear to be amateurs and chances are you will want to stop watching the movie.
Hypnotic suffers from bad direction. It has an interesting premise and the cast too, are all actors who have done well under good direction. But then you watch this movie and wonder, how is it that these actors whose performances you enjoyed in previous shows and movies are so terrible? Is that really how they are delivering dialogues? Were they always this bad?
Another thing that works against the movie is the costumes, particularly the wig the protagonist wears. It's so distracting that it doesn't matter what is going on in a scene, your eyes will fixate on that terrible wig.
Hypnotic is well, about using hypnosis as a therapy. But this is a horror movie and something that is used as an aid for people is obviously used for something far more devious than one can imagine.
HYPNOTIC Movie Plot
The movie opens with a woman leaving work and entering the elevator. Her name is Andrea Bowen and she makes a call about feeling like she's being watched all the time. She then receives a call from an unknown number which she promptly picks up and is told that the "World is ending". That's it for her. Andrea sees the walls of the elevator closing in and knows she will be crushed to death. She screams but no help comes and she succumbs to her fear.
In the next scene, we meet Jenn who is attending her friend Gina and Scott's housewarming party. Gina immediately comes out and tries to dissuade her from coming because her husband invited Brian to the party.
Who is Brian? He has some history with Jenn and gets about five minutes of screen time.
They make eye contact at the party and are supposedly avoiding each other but in the next scene are sitting at the same table.
Jenn is introduced to Gina's therapist Dr Collin Meade who doesn't mind attending his patient's parties. He's supposed to keep his cases confidential and there are no rules to stop him from fraternizing with his patients. The minute he meets Jenn who then shows little interest in him, he starts creeping up on her.
She's sitting with Brian and the hosts and Collin pops out of nowhere. His desperation to talk to Jenn should have raised a red flag then but it doesn't. Everyone finds it okay that a therapist is pushing his contact cards at them.
Gina wants Jenn to go because of the tragedy she faced which is Jenn miscarrying and taking it hard and then breaking up with Brian. But she still cares enough for him to stop him from eating something that has sesame in it. They do that in front of Collin to give him villainous ideas for later.
He's wearing a turtleneck and all so yeah, that's villain attire.
Jenn is convinced to go to Collin to help her move on and land a job. She goes in, he puts her under. When she wakes up, the time has passed and she asks him how she did to which Dr Collins replies she did fine.
Despite his evil intentions, which are revealed later, Dr Collin does manage to help Jenn get the job. She gets a prominent job immediately.
Dr Collins runs into her at the mall and invites her for coffee. Jenn agrees and then pesters him to reveal something about himself since he keeps butting into his patients' lives. Collin reveals his wife died recently. He asks about Brian and tells her to invite him over to her house and have dinner on her terms.
Later Jenn keeps getting vivid dreams of laying in bed with Dr Collins and being happy. She decides to take his advice forever and calls Brian for dinner.
But on the way to the grocery store to buy things for dinner, she gets a call from an unknown number. She picks it up and goes into a trance.
When she comes to, she finds herself at the table, plates of food in front of her. She hears choking sounds and goes to the bathroom to see Brian passed out near a puddle of vomit. She uses the epipen on him and calls the ambulance.
Brian is seriously harmed and goes into a coma. Jenn is ridden with guilt.
Gina comes over to console her and Jenn tells her she has no memory of what exactly happened. At home, she finds a receipt that shows that she intentionally bought sesame oil and poured it all over the salad.
Jenn has memories of doing that and begins to suspect Collins playing with her mind. She shares her doubts with Gina who doesn't believe her entirely until Jenn shows her articles where Dr Collins is mentioned. Then they go to the police where we meet Detective Wade Rollins.
He reveals he has always had doubts about the Andrea Bowen case and shows them a video of Andrea going berserk in the elevator and giving herself a heart attack. The women ask the Detective for advice to which he simply says, "Get a new therapist."
Great advice right there!
You would think the women would avoid going to Collins but Jenn has her mindset on getting him to confess his part in whatever happened to Brian so that she wouldn't feel guilty. She goes back to him and thinks she can play Detective. She uses a tape recorder to find out exactly what goes on when she's under hypnosis.
She thinks her plan is foolproof not realizing that there is a minor problem with that.
Jenn awakens from her hypnosis and smilingly asks the Doctor if everything went well. He replies that of course, it has. Jenn listens to the recording and finds out one fatal mistake of her plan. Dr Collins pretty much asks her when she's under if she suspects him and is recording him. She says yes. He then wants to know of her confidants and of course, Gina's name has popped up. Jenn frantically calls Gina.
Luckily for Collins, it so happens Gina is the one driving the car when he calls her from an unknown number to tell her the world is ending. Gina's deepest fear comes to life: a spider begins to crawl on her. She asks her husband to get it off her but of course, he can't see anything. Gina is so consumed by fear that she doesn't think rationally anymore and crashes the car.
Jenn knows exactly which road her friend was on and screams when she sees the accident. Gina is presumably dead as is her husband.
HYPNOTIC Ending Explained with Spoilers!
Jenn wants to get revenge as her only friend was taken away. But first things first, she wants to get rid of the hypnotic triggers Dr Meade has inserted in her mind and so on the advice of Detective Rollins, visits a therapist who aids the police in cases.
She talks to the therapist who tells her she understands her predicament and decides to put her under. Once under, Jenn makes choking sounds and mannerisms. The therapist panics before Jenn slips into memories.
Fortunately, the therapist's career is saved when Jenn is brought back with her sanity intact. Jenn tells her about the institute she saw and the date: March 6th.
The therapist claims she has never seen anything like this and is incapable of undoing what Dr Collins did to her. However, she sets up a fail-safe. After that Jenn asks what day it is. That day happens to be the 6th and Jenn immediately jumps off the couch with a plan. The therapist doesn't press for questions.
On the way, a tacky edited scene takes place where Jenn calls the Detective and tells him of her plans.
The Detective is already injured because Dr Collins had sent a woman implanted with false memories to beat him up. The Detective had been easily taken by a petite woman and ended up in the hospital. He warns Jenn to not go alone but Jenn has lost faith in his abilities after he gets beaten up by a petite woman.
Jenn learns that the doctor who ran the institute to conduct government experiments had a son who is none other than Dr Collins. He had recently lost his wife and picked women who look exactly like her and when he didn't get what he wanted from them or they began to suspect him, he got rid of them. He tells Jenn she even smelled like his dead wife so he had to bait her.
Jenn tries to make a run but Dr Collins uses his trigger words to control her. She awakens and manages to contact the Detective and inform him that she's been taken into the office. The Detective pulls away the tubes and all and calls for backup. The police make it to the office and break open the door only to find nobody.
Jenn awakens and finds herself in a bedroom with Dr Collins dressing her up as his dead wife because it is their anniversary. He's even doing a decent job painting her nails. Jenn realizes no one knows where she is but Detective Rollins manages to finally find out the relation between Dr Sullivan and Dr Collins. He couldn't do it for months ever since Andrea Bowen's case cropped up. He just now makes the connection and finds the address. He goes alone to go save her.
Jenn meanwhile makes a run and the Detective finally comes and struggles with the doctor. Jenn gets a hold of the gun and shoots. She faints and gets up to find the Detective cradling her and telling her what a fantastic shot she is and everything if going to be okay. Then he calls her 'my love' and she gets triggered. Now we too know that there was no way Jenn could have made that shot and killed the doctor. So it's no surprise.
Jenn was told by the therapist to see reality the minute she is called 'my love'. She gets up to see Dr Collins near her. There's more chasing around, more struggling before she finds the Detective who complains that she is a terrible shot and got him instead of the doctor.
Jenn apologises and then takes the gun and finally hits the target. Dr Collins is gone.
A month later, Brian still hasn't awakened but Jenn is up and about and visiting her new friend the Detective who has received a promotion for getting shot and solving the case of the evil therapist. He gives Jenn a gift. She leaves and opens the gift.
It is a CD of self-hypnosis. Jenn smiles and says "Good one."
It isn't. The joke wasn't funny at all but it amuses Jenn.
Haha your friend is dead, your fiance is in a coma and who knows how badly the doctor messed up your brain...but here's a CD to remind you to get self-hypnosis because it is your fault all this happened.
Well, at least the Detective got his promotion.
The movie was slow in parts, the acting, as mentioned above, was clunky and the wig...just terrible. A waste of perfectly good actors.
Scare scale: 2/5
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