BASIC INSTINCT 2. A Film Born Out of Desperation

Basic Instinct, AD 1992, caused quite a stir at the American box office — though even more so in the minds of local moralists, who one by one condemned the director (Paul Verhoeven), the screenwriter (Joe Eszterhas), and the lead actors (Michael Douglas, Sharon Stone, Jeanne Tripplehorn). Following the old and well-known rule that nothing sells like a little scandal, the film made Sharon Stone a first-rank star and elevated Joe Eszterhas to the position of Hollywood’s highest-paid screenwriter (though, to be fair, he squandered that reputation soon after with the disastrous Showgirls). Whatever one might say about Basic Instinct, it was a finely balanced thriller, blending intrigue, sex, and strong performances in just the right proportions. Its noir-inflected atmosphere and Jerry Goldsmith’s superb score — which still holds up years later — ensured that the film would be remembered regardless of Stone’s “appetizing” bedroom acrobatics. In short, the film entered cinema history.

The same can certainly never be said of its sequel.

Basic Instinct 2 had no luck. First, Carolco, the original film’s production company, went bankrupt. Joe Eszterhas refused to return to write the script. Actor after actor turned down the project. In the end, only Sharon Stone remained — her career fading with age and in need of a revival. Unfortunately, judging by the financial results, the revival might well have killed the patient. None of the “serious” candidates to play opposite an actress once considered among the smartest in Hollywood dared to take on Michael Douglas’s legacy — whether out of fear of competition or for other, equally valid reasons.

Ultimately, the role went to the little-known David Morrissey, with Michael Caton-Jones directing.

Nobody expected fireworks from a Basic Instinct sequel, nor a masterpiece. Many would have been satisfied with a merely average follow-up to a strong original. But no one anticipated it would be this bad. Looking back at the film days after watching it, I can hardly find a single element that could even serve as a flimsy excuse to see it in theaters with a clear conscience.

If one did, it would only be to savor the bitter satisfaction that something so awful could also be made outside our own borders.

At nearly every step, scene after scene, one sees the director’s incompetence and inability (or unwillingness) to control his lead actress. Recalling Stone’s first performance, we remember Catherine Tramell as sexy, alluring, cynical — a woman who inspired fascination but also a certain fear: immoral and dangerous. Catherine in this new version is little more than the sculpture of a surgeon-artist, an artificial creation of scalpel and silicone. She has no interior life; her character is built entirely on hollow gestures evoking nothing more than sexual innuendo and on pretentious lines that only cause embarrassment.

From a manipulator who kept men constantly off-balance, she has been reduced to a cartoonish femme fatale, cut out of a bad comic book — artificial and over-posed.

Stone’s mannerisms irritate even more when paired with the bland Morrissey, who sadly fails to demonstrate his acting skills — whether overshadowed by his star partner’s excesses or simply misdirected by Caton-Jones. The character of Dr. Michael Glass might have changed much in the film, but only if he had been crafted into a credible partner in the duel, rather than mere background for Stone’s overblown performance.

How is a well-constructed film (a thriller especially) built? In my view, so that the ending ties together all the clues an attentive viewer may have gathered throughout the story. That shows the skill of the screenwriter and director, while giving the viewer the pleasure of intellectual play and testing their wits. A prize to anyone who manages to do that here. What we get instead is a collection of loosely connected, uninspired scenes, laced with pretentious dialogue and stitched together with an ending sewn on with thread as thick as a ship’s rope. That, in short, is the screenplay of Basic Instinct 2.

A film like this can only be born of desperation. Whether it was Sharon Stone, burning with the fever of fading stardom, or producers hoping to squeeze a few more millions out of an exhausted franchise, it’s hard to say. One thing I know for certain: it is not worth paying to see this fruit of desperation.