Basic 2 a Bad Instinct
I never liked Paul Verhoeven’s “Basic Instinct.” Sure it was stylish and had viscerally sexy visual pizzazz, but the film itself did absolutely nothing for me. It was too manipulatively lurid, the acting far too arch and over-the-top, and while I freely admit certain scenes provided a certain psychosexual kick the majority was a startlingly untitillating disappointing bore.
Audiences (and more than a few critics) disagreed with me, making the 1992 picture a surprising box office smash and a cultural hot button. The film also made a star out of Sharon Stone, catapulting the actress out of B-movie schlock like “King Solomon’s Mines” and into A-list vehicles like “The Muse,” “The Mighty” and Martin Scoresese’s “Casino” (for which she received a well deserved Academy Award nomination). Stone became a force to be reckoned with, and even if there are a few more items like “Sliver” than “Broken Flowers” on her resume Hollywood still thinks of her as an above-the-title superstar.
Well, if the actress’ overacting theatrics in the remarkably dreadful “Catwoman” didn’t turn her into a has-been, the pointless “Basic Instinct 2” should do the trick nicely. The movie isn’t “Showgirls” bad, but it is pretty darn close. It’s absurd, snidely ludicrous with a woefully feral performance by Stone that’s so unintentionally laughable I almost can’t believe she can go on daytime talk shows and promote the thing with a straight face.
Seriously, though, did the world really need a sequel to “Basic Instinct” 14 years after the fact? Sure Stone still looks great, and if I have half the body she’s got when I’m 48 I’d sure as heck probably want to show it off naked, too. (Okay, so not really, I’m far too much of a prude, but the thought is a good one at the very least.) But a woman’s sexy body isn’t remotely a reason to produce a major motion picture (not that this has ever stopped Hollywood), and as there is actual bona fide filmmaking talent behind the scenes the people making this sure as heck should have known better.
The fact is, writers Leora Barish (“Desperately Seeking Susan”) and Henry Bean (“The Believer,” “Internal Affairs”), as well as director Michael Caton-Jones (“Scandal,” “This Boy’s Life”), are far too good at their jobs to basically do nothing more than rehash the original scene for scene. Moving the location from San Francisco to London and converting Michael Douglas’ detective into David Morrissey’s criminal psychiatrist doesn’t begin to hide the fact part two is more remake than sequel. No amount of visual razzle-dazzle (courtesy cinematographer Gyula Pados, “The Heart of Me”) can hide this fact from an audience, and for all Caton-Jones’ usual strengths as a director his work here borders on the clueless.
But as bad as the script gets (and it gets pretty darn bad) and as slack as the direction is, this monstrosity is nearly made a so-bad-it’s-good classic thanks to Stone. She’s absolutely atrocious, Catherine Tramell becoming an unintentional laughingstock as this picture goes on, something that never occurred the first time she disrobed on camera back in ’92. The actress vamps it up considerably, up to such monolithic heights she puts even her performance in the ill-fated “Diabolique” remake to shame (and for the few who’ve actually scene it than you know just exactly how monumental this achievement really is).
Unfortunately, as abysmal as things get “Basic Instinct 2” never quite achieves a level of awfulness worthy of respect and applause. Thanks to Stone (and with an assist from the usually reliable David Thewlis and Charlotte Rampling) it does come close, but only tantalizingly so. As it is, the movie is just bad enough to laugh at a time or two and nothing more, leaving me to think the best instinct might be to leave the theater curtain closed and hope to open our naked eyes to entertainment elsewhere.
Film Rating: ê (out of 4)
