Basic Instinct

by Stevie Simkin

Paul Verhoeven's 1992 thriller Basic Instinct - starring Michael Douglas as a police detective and Sharon Stone as the femme fatale Catherine Tramell - was one of the first mainstream 'erotic thrillers', a film which shifted the boundaries for graphic representations of sex in Hollywood cinema. It remains a significant milestone in film censorship and controversy. In his fascinating study, the first in-depth account of the film, Stevie Simkin explores the unrest and protest that Basic Instinct sparked in the gay, lesbian and feminist communities in the US, incensed by what they saw as the script's homophobia and misogyny.

Simkin considers the social and cultural context in which Basic Instinct was made, examining the film's troubled production history, the battles with censors, and its reception. He offers a number of readings of the movie, looking at its representation of bisexuality and the depiction of a 'transgressive' female protagonist. He also focuses on key sequences, including the infamous interrogation scene, and details the cuts demanded by the censors, resulting in different UK and US versions. In conclusion, Simkin considers the legacy of Basic Instinct , and its enduring effect on media representations of the violent woman.

STEVIE SIMKIN is Reader in Drama and Film at the University of Winchester, UK. His publications include work on cult television, popular music, and Renaissance drama. He is the author of, amongst other works, A Preface to Marlowe (1999), Revenge A New Casebook (2001), Early Modern Tragedy and the Cinema of Violence (2005), and, also in the Controversies series, a book on the Peckinpah film, Straw Dogs .

192 pages, Paperback

First published March 12, 2013

Reviews

[Jacob · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fairly decent little book that dissects the controversies surrounding the film Basic Instinct. This is part of a series put out by Bloomsbury which examines a number of contentious movies. I was totally ignorant of the shitstorm that Basic Instinct caused at the time of its release. I always thought of it as just another run of the mill femme fatale thriller from the early 90s. It turns out many queer and feminist activist groups were outraged by what they perceived as misogyny and anti-gay/lesbian themes portrayed on screen. All of this pretty much stemming from an incredibly shallow reading of the film. Anyway, the book is highly detailed and good to read while watching the movie back to back (like the rest in this series) but unless you’re really interested in in Basic Instinct or the history of movies and their relationship to the US cultural wars it might not be for you.
As for the movie, I thought it was an okay popcorn flick that was a lot of fun. A pomo neo noir pastiche that can
work as feminist and anti-feminist film as well as pro and anti LGBTQ. It made me more interested to dive deeper into Paul Verhoeven’s filmography.