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Basic Instinct by Stephen Farber The lurid Basic Instinct can be accused of many things, but complexity would not be one of them. This is a whodunnit with only two suspects; the gay activists who have sought to sabotage the movie by revealing the murderer's identity aren't giving away too much, since the film doesn't exactly have a brain-twisting plot. The basic story line is the one that Hitchcock mined effectively in Suspicion; it's about someone who becomes involved with a paramour who may be a homicidal maniac. Screenwriter Joe Eszterhas borrowed this story once before, in Jagged Edge, and this time it's embellished with grisly slasher scenes inspired by Psycho as well as a Psycho copycat, Brian De Palma's Dressed to Kill. (The elevator murder from De Palma's movie is reproduced in Basic Instinct.) Is the movie homophobic, misogynistic and sensationalistic? Yes indeed. But even more startling, it's almost completely lacking in suspense. A couple of scenes are jazzy and scary, but Eszterhas and director Paul Verhoeven have no idea of how to tighten the vise as the movie continues. There's no real sense of jeopardy. The stars both fail to involve us emotionally. Michael Douglas's cop has no vulnerability. Sharon Stone is effective enough at conveying naked lust and cold-hearted calculation, but she's not enough of an actress to suggest that the lady might actually have tender romantic feelings for the man she's manipulating. There's none of the teasing ambiguity that Barbara Stanwyck and Kathleen Turner brought to the femmes fatales they played in Double Indemnity and Body Heat. Stone acts on only one note. But then, it's hard to do much with a character who has no discernible motivation for the murders she perpetrates. Audiences are clearly titillated by the raunchy sex, but as an exercise in cinematic suspense, Basic Instinct is a pitiful pale echo of past glories. What did you think of this movie? Sound off in the Movie Forum. |
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