Basic Instinct, (1992 ) starred Michael Douglas and Sharon Stone in amazing powerful performances. Basic Instinct was one of the decades best films; winning MTV Awards’ best female actress in a motion picture award (Sharon Stone), golden screen award for best picture, nominated for golden globe and academy awards, for a total of 16 nominations and 5 wins.
Main Characters
Michael Douglas as Detective Nick Curran
Sharon Stone as Catherine Tramell
George Dzundza as Gus Moran
Jeanne Tripplehorn as Dr. Beth Garner
Basic Instinct Plot
A murder has occurred and Detective Nick Curran is assigned to the case. The murder suspect is the ex-girlfriend of the deceased who happens to be a beautiful, seductive young novelist. Curran’s libido is in full swing, but he also must do his job. He is convinced that she has committed the crime after finding out from his ex-girlfriend, the psychiatrist assigned to the case, that Catherine the novelist, has written a novel on the details of the murder before it even happened. As he tries to outsmart the incredibly beautiful and intellectual savvy Catherine, passion takes over; they cannot escape their basic instinct and the two become lovers.
Now, Curran is no longer convinced that she has murdered her ex-boyfriend, but is his detective training influencing his convictions or is his sexual desires? This is all you will get from me. I hate spoiling the story for people.
My Thoughts on the Film
This is truly a whodunit of the highest caliber. The director takes you just where he wants you to go; a path leading to nowhere, where you begin to doubt everything. Is Curran professional enough to stay on the job, is Catherine guilty or not, and what about Dr. Garner, how does she know so much?
I love movies where you feel what the hero feels. In this movie we feel Curran’s confusion. As the plot thickens, we see how he begins to doubt even his own ex-lover though at first we wonder if his libido has truly taken over. After the plot unfolds, we know that he is onto something big. Sharon Stone was not originally going to be picked for this part. She was a virtual newcomer on the scene, but the critics say it was the uninhibited way she opened her legs to display everything that gave the powers that be the notion that she had the guts to pull off this role to perfection, and that she did. It was a commanding performance and Michael Douglas and Sharon Stone had electrifying chemistry on the screen.
Besides the exciting twists and turns in this movie, Basic Instinct makes you think about personal involvement and how it can cloud professional thinking. In this case, it was a hormone driven detective, but it could have been a doctor, a lawyer, a school teacher, boss, or any professional under the sun. How true are our professional evaluations of a situation when we become personally involved? Is it possible to remain professional? Can we overcome our own personal biases to do our job correctly, especially when we see how Detective Curran was caught in the maze of power, wit, and sex and driven to the edge because of it? The movie infers when you get personally involved, you begin to play a dangerous game.
On a scale of 1 - 5 I rate this movie a 5, as it is truly excellent.
