Trance (Rhoades)

“Trance” Is

Spellbinding

Thriller

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

In high school I read a book on hypnotism and took great delight in putting my classmates into light trances. Boy, I wish I could have mesmerized one of them into stealing a valuable painting and giving it to me … but all I could do is convince someone her hand was too heavy to lift.

In “Trance,” a professional hypnotherapist (played by Rosario Dawson) displays much greater skill than my teenage amateur efforts. Seems an art auctioneer and his colleague (James McAvoy and Vincent Cassell) steal a painting, but lose it when one of them gets amnesia from a blow on the head. So they hire the hypnotherapist to help befuddled Simon (McAvoy) remember where he hid it.

The trance that she puts him in is more than he was expecting. In this who’s-on-first thriller, we learn once again that greed trumps science.

Director Danny Boyle (“Trainspotting,” “Slumdog Millionaire”) begs film reviewers to “protect the film’s most intimate secret.” So no spoilers here.

Boyle describes the film as “a puzzle with clues and mysteries.”

What’s his opinion of hypnosis? “The reputation of hypnotherapy, of hypnosis, if you like, has changed a bit. It became very legally submissible evidence in cases and then it got discredited because of suggested memories were proved to be untrue. Since then, hypnosis has been trying to rebuild its image.”

He adds, “There’s an idea with hypnosis that you’re never fully asleep, that you won’t do anything that you don’t want to do anyway. But what we found is that in 5% to 10% of the population, there are people who are what they call virtuosos. These are people who are highly suggestible. Although what we depict in the movie is ethically very dubious, it’s actually clinically possible. It makes for a great premise for a movie, really, and a complex and intriguing and puzzling movie that you’ve got to find your way through.”

So look into my eyes and repeat after me, “I will buy a ticket …”

srhoades@aol.com