Basic Instinct 2

by Stefan Halley

I’m sure when the DVD is released there will be a super sexy uncut version of the film.  Maybe then we’ll see something worth watching.  The only risk in this film is boredom.

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Fourteen years in the making and my how times have changed.  Basic Instinct took in $350 million and made Sharon Stone a household name as well as ushered in the erotic thriller into the mainstream.  The first film was sexy, violent and completely pulp-fiction.  Director Paul Verhoeven crafted the perfect erotic film noir.  Stone returns as novelist Catherine Tramell.  Sadly that’s the only thing left over from the original as Basic Instinct 2 lacks all of the sex, seduction, eroticism and violence.

BI2 moves from sunny San Francisco to cold, sleek London.  Catherine Tramell is racing through London at speed over 100 mph while her drugged boyfriend checks to see if she’s wearing panties.  Just as she is climaxing, Catherine takes the sports car off the street and smoothly lands in the middle of a canal where she escapes but her boyfriend drowns. 

Detective Superintendent Roy Washburn (David Thewlis, the best thing about this film) holds Catherine on murder charges.  He orders a psych evaluation and in walks Dr. Michael Glass (David Morrissey because Liam Neeson must of turned them down).  Dr. Glass and Catherine play a little mental cat-and-mouse, but ultimately she’s released only to seek his time later for counseling.  She quickly gets inside his head and dismantles his life.  It’s only a matter of time before people start dying and someone has to take the blame.

British director Michael Caton-Jones replaces Verhoeven’s voyeurism with something that is shameful and must be hidden away.  The few sex scenes that are left in the film are off-putting and only briefly seen.  The film hangs on the relationship between Glass and Tramell.  Apparently Dr. Glass wasn’t as composed as he original appears because after two or three brief meetings he’s obsessing about her.  Once his life falls apart, which happens incredibly fast, the film is just a downward spiral of suck.

Stone is unabashed in mugging at the camera.  She grins, winks and tries to look as sexy as possible.  She succeeds for the most part.  Even at almost 50, Sharon Stone looks good.  Stone is able to give Catherine Tramell life again and make the film at times almost watchable.  David Morrissey is horribly miscast and his cold-fish Dr. Glass is obliviously no match for Stone’s Tramell.  He blankly goes from one scene to the next not emoting until the end when his life has completely fallen apart. 

I’m sure when the DVD is released there will be a super sexy uncut version of the film.  Maybe then we’ll see something worth watching.  The only risk in this film is boredom.