"Basic Instinct 2" review

Basic Instinct 2 (2006)

Directed by Michael Caton-Jones
Writing credits Leora Barish Henry Bean

Sharon Stone.... Catherine Davis Tramell
David Morrissey.... Dr. Michael Glass
Charlotte Rampling.... Milena Gardosh
David Thewlis.... Roy Washburn

Sharon Stone is back! And nobody cares! Well, I wanted to care but after seeing “Basic Instinct 2”, I just don’t care anymore. Stone gets implicated in another murder when she drives off the road with a dead man. They call in a psychiatrist to evaluate her. They want to know if Sharon Stone is still hot and seductive enough to be in a “Basic Instinct” sequel. He says, “Yeah man!”. Stone has found her new lover/sucker/victim.

“Basic Instinct 2” is a sequel to one of the greatest mainstream sleaze movies ever made. In the first movie, Stone was a sex fiend, destroying any worthless man who got in her way. In this lame sequel, Stone is more interested in playing (boring) mind games with her shrink. I can’t believe the filmmakers have the audacity to call this a sequel. Where’s the violence? Where’s the sex? Where is the SLEAZE?! Come on people! Did they even bother watching the first movie to understand why it was so popular? Where’s Paul Verhoeven when we need him?

“Basic Instinct 2” really only exists because Sharon Stone wanted to have a fashion show. This movie lets her show off her hard body in various hot outfits. There’s only one Stone sex scene in the entire movie. And it’s lame! So dang lame! Instead of an ice pick, now she’s into putting belts around her lover’s necks. Zzzzzzz…

The overriding problem with this movie is that Sharon Stone is just not seductive enough to make me believe that she could drive a man insane with passion. Now don’t get me wrong. Sharon Stone looks great. She’s got a nice hard body, long legs and is very attractive. But I didn’t buy that she was the living embodiment of sex that no man could resist. She vamped it up to a level that would have had any guy laughing his head off at her inane chatter. In fact, there were guys laughing their heads off and they were sitting in the movie theater with me.

There’s a brief scene at the end which has Sharon Stone topless in a hot tub. That was kind of nice. But for a sequel to a movie that inspired more B-erotic thrillers than any other movie in history, “Basic Instinct 2” is an impotent tragedy. A complete waste of time. Although it’s not enough of a flaming train wreck to make you go insane, it is very lame and boring. Let Stone flash her basic instinct somewhere else.

SCORE: 1.5 out of 4 vamping Stones