Untraceable has one major thing going for it that most techno-thrillers don?t: a plausible premise using real technology. Director Gregory Hoblit?s been primed for this film from previous directorial efforts, on everything from NYPD Blue to Frequency. For Untraceable, he worked very closely with former FBI special agent E.J. Hilbert of the cyber-crimes unit to make sure the film remained well within the realm of reality?and all the more horrifying.

[Note: Be sure to check out our interview with Untraceable star Diane Lane and our interview with Colin Hanks, her co-star.]

I understand it is mostly pedophile crime that you track?

Hilbert: No. That is the most known. It?s the only undercover case in the FBI that everyone knows about. We do everything. My focus was Eastern European hacking groups and international hackers as a whole. [They would] gain access to systems, and grab anything they could get that was of value. Or, hack into somebody?s computer so they could hide their tracks. Just like we see in this movie.

It is plausible, what happens in this movie?

Hilbert: It is plausible. I wouldn?t have done it with these guys if it wasn?t. [The crew] spent a great deal of time trying to be as realistic as possible, and in the voyeuristic society that we have, where kids are posting videos like this left and right....if you know what you are doing, you can hide yourself for a period of time. But, on that same note, the fact that we can tell this story means that we can track you back. A year ago, when I first got involved [with the film] it would have been slower than it is now. Next year, it will be faster than it is this year, and so on. At this point in time, with some of the guys who are far smarter than I ever will be, you could probably get a site down between 24 and 72 hours, if it is in the States. If it is international, it would take a bit longer.

The numbers that this website gets, and how quickly they get them... is that really possible?

Hoblit: At one point Allison [Burnett, one of the writers] wrote copy that, over the course of the case, over 100 million people have checked into this website. And I said, ?Oh come on, there?s only 300 million people in this country.? Then I went to my 22-year-old internet crackerjack... just the hits alone on MySpace in a day, or some of the other big ones... it just blows your mind. But with the movie... it?s just part of the entertainment.

People say, ?Why do you think this would be so popular?? Well, go back to the Christians and the lions. They could fill a coliseum with people to watch a bunch of lions eat a bunch of Christians. Or you go to France, and the guillotine. They would fill a whole square to watch someone?s head get cut off. Or the 1920s, 30s, 40s, with lynchings?they would have parties, and watch some person get hung. This is kind of the contemporary version of that. In a push of a button, a million people can be reached.

In your film, there is ?gruesome? violence, but it never quite goes too far. Was there a temptation to go further?

Hoblit: No. I was not interested in making a slasher movie at all. It can become pornography really fast. We had to show just enough of it to tell the story, to show the progression of each person who was... in trouble. The cat got off the easiest. We debated this a lot. Not that I am going to put this movie up there on that level, but our models were Seven and Silence of the Lambs. Except that in both those movies, the people are already dead. No matter how grotesque the murders were, how hard it was to look at someone who had been in a river for five or six days, or had been skinned, they were already dead. Here, we are watching people actually being killed, and it became a harder task to measure that out in dollops that didn?t get in the way of the story being told, or the characters that were telling the story.

What about Saw and Hostel and things like that, where the audience sees people get ghoulishly tortured?

Hoblit: I have no interest in people coming to see this movie if that is what they are interested in seeing. You could make the B-movie version of this movie, and that?s what it would be, but that didn?t interest me. The story I wanted to tell was the phenomenon that we are in the middle of [of internet crime], and the people who are trying to deal with it on a regular basis to protect the rest of us, and how it impacts the lives of people like [Diane Lane?s character] Marsh. She gets up in the morning and she takes everything she learned the day before with her to work, and she goes back home, then gets up and does it again, and every day she is a bit smarter. I want people to walk away from this understanding that there are institutions out there like the Bureau that are on it every day.
The badge at the end [when Diane thrusts her FBI badge into the camera], was kind of a moment of triumph for her. But I also look at that moment in a more cynical way. She won the battle, but they are not winning the war.

Is there a high burn-out rate for cyber-crime agents?

Hilbert: You know what you signed up for. And if you don?t you can change what you are working on. You become almost schizophrenic.

Hoblit: I worked with an FBI agent up in Portland, Jane Brillhart [the agent Diane Lane?s character was modeled after]. It was perfect. She happened to be about Diane?s age, with three kids and juggling a life. She and her husband met at Quantico. Her husband, Joe, had been very involved in cyber-crimes before she was. She came on, they were both working there, and he couldn?t handle it. The kid stuff just got to him. At some point, she was saying that every six months or so they would give you a mental evaluation, just bringing agents in to talk for a bit. Because you are seeing and hearing stuff every day that is beyond belief.
What was interesting in the dynamic of that family was that Joe couldn?t handle it. He moved over to forensics. He pulls apart hard drives and does analysis. And she?s over here [in cyber-crimes] having a great time. For example, she was working on a case, posing as a thirteen-year-old, talking to some guy in Chicago who wanted to get into this ?kid?s? pants. She set up the meet, where he would fly in and they would meet at the airport, but he didn?t come. I said ?Oh, too bad.? She said, ?Don?t worry, he?ll come. It?s just a matter of time.? She came to visit one day on the set and I asked her how it was going. She said ?I ruined two lives today, it was great.? She just nailed two people and thought it was Christmas. Makes it worth it.