Hollow Man (with Mike Thorn)

When Sony gave Paul Verhoeven $100 million to adapt H.G. Wells' "The Invisible Man," they might not have been expecting a nihilistic, hard-R slasher, but that's what they got! Kevin Bacon underwent a notoriously grueling shoot with groundbreaking VFX to give what is still the most bleakly realistic depiction of the source material to date. Many directors have offered their take on the question: What would a man do if nobody could see him? But only Verhoeven could bravely answer: "Well, he'd probably rape his neighbor and brutally murder his co-workers!"
Novelist and critic Mike Thorn joins the podcast to unpack the film that sent Verhoeven packing his bags and heading back to Europe for good. Is this the last time Hollywood produced an expensive summer movie with an utterly despicable protagonist? Could this movie even get made today and would it survive the discourse that would inevitably ensue? Is Kevin Bacon one of our most underrated actors? Remember when Hollywood tried to convince us Josh Brolin could play a scientist? Has there ever been a more incestuous professional workplace than the lab these horny scientists work in? Find out all this and more in our final Rotten Verhoeven film!
You can find Mike Thorn's fantastic writing at mikethornwrites.com and follow him on Twitter & IG @mikethornwrites.

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