Despite the inevitability of being followed around by cries of nepotism running wild after playing a major role in virtually every Mike Flanagan project to have released since they first met, it’s well worth remembering that Kate Siegel has a stellar career of her own outside of her husband’s filmography, even if Hypnotic won’t be remembered as part of it.
The Netflix original was released in October of 2021, but has long since been lost to the depths of the content library for reasons that should be patently obvious to anyone that’s seen it. Remarkably given how the two parties regularly tend to have vastly differing opinions on the merits of any given project, critics and audiences cared for it with the exact same levels of indifference.
On Rotten Tomatoes, co-directors Matt Angel and Suzanne Coote could only see their psychological thriller garner identical approval ratings of 24 percent, a far cry from the widespread acclaim Siegel has become accustomed to on the streaming service following Hush, Gerald’s Game, The Haunting of Hill House, Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, and The Fall of the House of Usher, even if she does give a stellar performance in the lead role.
It may have been swept under the rug by Netflix’s algorithm, but the story of a woman caught up in a dangerous game of mental cat-and-mouse has been enjoying a resurgence on a rival streaming service, with FlixPatrol naming Hypnotic – which unfortunately holds the same moniker as one of the year’s most infamous flops – as one of the most-watched movies on Rakuten.