Which is not to say that people won’t line up to see this movie. The word is out that it’s “hot.” The sex and gore are plentiful, with lots of smash-your-partner-against-the-wall couplings, and if you can forget how hard the actors are struggling to work up a lather, some scenes are actually titillating. But who are these people entangled in all this angry, sweaty lovemaking
This much we know: a rich San Francisco rock impresario has been done in by the shapely blonde with the ice pick. Enter police detective Nick Curran (Douglas), nicknamed " Shooter" for his unfortunate habit of gunning down innocent bystanders. Now enter three very odd female suspects. The most suspicious is the rich, dirty-talking Catherine Tramell (Sharon Stone), a novelist whose books’ story lines uncannily resemble the murders that are about to unfold. Haughty, powerful and bisexual, she quickly seduces the spellbound detective while flaunting her relationship with her jealous girlfriend, Roxy (Leilani Sarelle). Nick, too, has another girlfriend, police psychologist Beth Garner (Jeanne Tripplehorn), who it turns out has some very dark secrets in her own violent, bisexual past.
During filming, “Basic Instinct” was the object of vociferous protest in the gay community for its depiction of homicidal lesbians. They weren’t wrong to holler (there’s one gratuitously ugly scene in which Nick baits Roxy, calling her Rocky) but the truth is that every woman in this bizarre male fantasy–straight, gay, bi or undetermined–is or has been a killer. Indeed, the female roles in “Basic Instinct” are so peculiarly conceived, you’d swear the men who made this movie had never met a woman.
It’s hard to believe the man who made " The 4th Man!’ (a good film about a murderous femme fatale) found a shred of psychological plausibility in Eszterhas’s ham-fisted script. (The writer likes his clunky dialogue so much he repeats all his best lines two or three times.) Verhoeven gives it slickness– Jan De Bont’s cinematography is so glossy you’d think he was making “Lawrence of Arabia”–but he can’t make us care about his characters. We’re supposed to think our hero is deep and complex because he falls for a woman he suspects may kill him. Since no spark of love exists between Stone and Douglas on screen, he just seems like a fool who can’t keep his pants zipped. “Basic Instinct” may offer a few jolts of eroticism and dread, but it feels endless: it can’t sustain any suspense. Funniest of all is that this whodunit gets so tangled up in its twists that half the audience can’t figure out who did dunit when it’s over. This may present a problem for the gay and lesbian activists who plan to sabotage the film by revealing the culprit to ticket buyers: are they sure they’ve got it right?
A final question. Why does the ratings board consider this an R movie and deem " Henry & June" NC-17? Only one answer suggests itself: explicit eroticism is OK if accompanied by hostility and mutilated flesh, but God save our children from the sight of two undressed people up on screen giving each other simple pleasure.
title: “Kiss Kiss Slash Slash” ShowToc: true date: “2022-12-20” author: “Wendy Parr”
Which is not to say that people won’t line up to see this movie. The word is out that it’s “hot.” The sex and gore are plentiful, with lots of smash-your-partner-against-the-wall couplings, and if you can forget how hard the actors are struggling to work up a lather, some scenes are actually titillating. But who are these people entangled in all this angry, sweaty lovemaking
This much we know: a rich San Francisco rock impresario has been done in by the shapely blonde with the ice pick. Enter police detective Nick Curran (Douglas), nicknamed " Shooter" for his unfortunate habit of gunning down innocent bystanders. Now enter three very odd female suspects. The most suspicious is the rich, dirty-talking Catherine Tramell (Sharon Stone), a novelist whose books’ story lines uncannily resemble the murders that are about to unfold. Haughty, powerful and bisexual, she quickly seduces the spellbound detective while flaunting her relationship with her jealous girlfriend, Roxy (Leilani Sarelle). Nick, too, has another girlfriend, police psychologist Beth Garner (Jeanne Tripplehorn), who it turns out has some very dark secrets in her own violent, bisexual past.
During filming, “Basic Instinct” was the object of vociferous protest in the gay community for its depiction of homicidal lesbians. They weren’t wrong to holler (there’s one gratuitously ugly scene in which Nick baits Roxy, calling her Rocky) but the truth is that every woman in this bizarre male fantasy–straight, gay, bi or undetermined–is or has been a killer. Indeed, the female roles in “Basic Instinct” are so peculiarly conceived, you’d swear the men who made this movie had never met a woman.
It’s hard to believe the man who made " The 4th Man!’ (a good film about a murderous femme fatale) found a shred of psychological plausibility in Eszterhas’s ham-fisted script. (The writer likes his clunky dialogue so much he repeats all his best lines two or three times.) Verhoeven gives it slickness– Jan De Bont’s cinematography is so glossy you’d think he was making “Lawrence of Arabia”–but he can’t make us care about his characters. We’re supposed to think our hero is deep and complex because he falls for a woman he suspects may kill him. Since no spark of love exists between Stone and Douglas on screen, he just seems like a fool who can’t keep his pants zipped. “Basic Instinct” may offer a few jolts of eroticism and dread, but it feels endless: it can’t sustain any suspense. Funniest of all is that this whodunit gets so tangled up in its twists that half the audience can’t figure out who did dunit when it’s over. This may present a problem for the gay and lesbian activists who plan to sabotage the film by revealing the culprit to ticket buyers: are they sure they’ve got it right?
A final question. Why does the ratings board consider this an R movie and deem " Henry & June" NC-17? Only one answer suggests itself: explicit eroticism is OK if accompanied by hostility and mutilated flesh, but God save our children from the sight of two undressed people up on screen giving each other simple pleasure.
