FILMandMOVIEmaking.com

5 stars*****

To understand the culture behind Basic Instinct, you need to look at the brilliant writing of Joe Eszterhas. While others may argue about his bigger and perhaps (technically) better successes with other films, here at filmandmoviemaking.com we give this film a 5* rating because it scores high in every area.

Joe’s words flow from the page. What you see in the script is really what you see on the screen. I thought that by reading the script I might actually find out who did commit the murders in the film. I still don’t know. We are cleverly led in one direction, on to another probability and then just as we think we know, the script takes us back where we started – or does it?

Sometimes you watch a movie and think that writers have colluded with directors and just left in great pages of average writing in an otherwise great movie. Here, in basic Instinct, every single word has been crafted like Paul McCartney writing ‘Yesterday’. Not a single word out of place. Not a single word wasted. Not a single word in excess.

This thriller is brilliantly directed by Paul Verhoeven, who, on listening to his discussion about the film, is still so enthusiastic about his project, that he cradles it like a baby, marvels at it’s first steps, and is in raptures as she leaves home.

Sharon Stone made her mark in the industry with this film. She’ll always be regarded very highly for her performance here. She not only has her police counterpart on a short piece of string; we get the feeling she’s doing that with the audience as well.

The sex scenes are completed well, the nudity is without excess, but we are enthused enough to want to know more. It builds her character; it builds what those around her think of her. For its day the sex, nudity, lesbian relationship and club (real dirty) dancing were ahead of their time in a quality movie. Those standards may have been left behind now for much more ‘in your face’ images, but it stands the passage of time. It’s as fresh today as it was back in 1992.

If you’re a writer wanting to write a great script, study this film. If you’re a director wanting to learn those extra secrets in moving the script from storyboard to screen, study this film. If you want to see how an actor works the camera, the audience and the crew, study this film.

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