BASIC INSTINCT 2: RISK ADDITION(R)
* (out of 5)
March 31, 2006
STARRING
Sharon Stone as CATHERINE TRAMELL
David Morrissey as DR. MICHAEL GLASS
Charlotte Rampling as MILENA GARDOSH
David Thewlis as ROY WASHBURN
Hugh Dancy as ADAM TOWERS
Anne Caillon as LANEY WARD
Studio: MGM
Directed by: Michael Caton-Jones
BY KEVIN CARR
“Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction” was a religious experience for me. Keep in mind, though, that’s not a good thing. Think of it as the religious experience you undergo when you almost die in a car crash or learn you have cancer. It made me reevaluate my life as many people do under extreme duress.
The biggest question going through everyone’s mind about this film is “Why?” But I also question “Why now?” The second question is easier to answer. After colossal bombs like “Catwoman,” “Cold Creek Manor,” “The Muse” and “Gloria” riddling her career landscape, Sharon Stone needed to bring in some cash.
By the “Why?” is so much more elusive. The idea of a sexual-predator, lipstick-lesbian serial killer was hip and cool fourteen years ago, but it’s passe now. Not to mention the fact that Stone herself is getting old in the tooth (48 years old this month, which is ancient in Hollywood terms). Sure, the old broad looks pretty good in the film, but who wouldn’t with fake boobs and a lacquer finish of make-up an inch thick?
This new film takes place in London where Catherine Tramell (Stone) has gotten mixed up in another murder investigation. She’s appointed a court psychologist named Dr. Glass (played by a woefully dull David Morrissey) to evaluate her for bail and soon she starts a cat-and-mouse game with him. Once she’s released, dead bodies start cropping up around town – all linked to her.
Of course, Glass obsesses about her, even to the point of fantasizing about her from her book cover photo while he’s banging a majorly hot babe half her age.
I loved the first “Basic Instinct” – not just because of the taboo it carried a decade and a half ago, but also because it was a slick mystery thriller. There’s none of that original spark in this sequel, though. In many ways, it reminded me of Ridley Scott’s awful “Hannibal,” which paled in comparison to the original “Silence of the Lambs”…
…only worse. What is it about Hollywood that makes them think they can repeat a story by just setting it in Europe or Asia instead? (And hold onto your hats, folks, because a trailer I saw before this film was a new “Fast and Furious” movie set in Tokyo, no less.)
Everything about “Basic Instinct 2” is substandard to the original. Even the sex is lackluster. I’m sure no one’s surprised that there isn’t a gratuitous beaver shot like the first one. The violence isn’t even there for the gore hounds. Rather, it’s a lot of talking, serious looks at the camera and pans across Sharon Stone’s bare legs.
Stone isn’t just her name, but it also describes her acting. The cold-hearted Catherine Tramell didn’t open up much in the original, but there was some depth of character. Here, she just talks dirty – and she doesn’t even do it very well. Sharon Stone better not quit her day job, ‘cause she’ll never make it as a phone sex operator. Here’s an example of her excruciatingly bad dialogue: “I was scared. I might never come again.”
Ouch. In fact, the only decent acting and line delivery comes from David Thewlis as the corrupt police detective hot on Catherine’s trail.
I knew that “Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction” was on thin ice when they started yanking press screenings. I never got my chance to see the movie ahead of time, so I took one for the team, forked over my admission and choked it down. I wasted $6.50 on a matinee. They got my money. Hold on closely to yours.
In the end, this film spurred a different sort of basic instinct in myself: sleep. It was a struggle to keep awake through the entire movie.