"...Hal's interpretation of that innner beauty translated in terms of his own shallow & programmed concepts of what beauty was..."
That's sort of true from a direct interpretation standpoint. But just to be precise, we can't really say that it was a Hal-interpretation effect. He was made to see them that way by the hypno-hex. It was Tony Robbins's way of getting Hal to accept and be with someone with inner beauty. Hal didn't distort the intended effect based on his appearance-judging tendency. There was no other intention except to trick his senses in that exact way.
So it was Tony Robbins who was actually upholding conventional beauty's pre-eminence. He's using one kind of beauty as a metaphor for another, but in so doing, reinforcing that those trappings of conventional beauty do, in fact, constitute proper "physical beauty" itself.
And regarding Hal, we don't know if he really appreciates the inner beauty that causes the illusion, or just wishes the illusion were real, and would be satisfied if only that were there, with the inner beauty being strictly optional.
____________________
reply
share
tu-agamemnon
12 years ago
Well we don't know exactly how Hal was hypnotized to visualize inner beauty, only that he was made to see it. The parts we do know about involve shocking his nervous system while reminiscing about a particularly shallow memory and afterwards closing his eyes and imagine being in a serene environment and seeing into a woman's soul. The hypnosis had the sole purpose of making Hal see inner beauty so we can't really say seeing good women as thin and pretty wasn't a Hal-interpretation effect.
Tony replaces one set of programming with another (Hal's dying father's last words to him) so maybe he was limited in terms of how Hal would interpret it. Equating a good personality with Hal's standards for physical looks could have been a predictable side effect but certainly was not the purpose of the exercise. Tony clearly thought it was shallow to make judgements based on physical characteristics (and had very different notions about what was beautiful) so I doubt it was an intended trick. And Hal does come to appreciate the inner beauty for what it is because, post-hypnosis, he isn't as shallow about the burn victim child and can look at Rosemary as is and call her beautiful.
reply
share