Basic Instinct 2


Artykuł pochodzi z pisma "Guardian"


Peter Bradshaw
Friday March 31, 2006
The Guardian

Poor Sharon Stone. She's still big; it's the erotic thrillers that got small. Stone was once in the biggest of them all: Basic Instinct, the film that did for the video pause button what email was later to do for the @ key. It came out in 1992, when Bill Clinton was in the bright springtime of his administration and the collective fear of Aids was beginning to recede, though still strong enough to enforce a reference to "protection" in Joe Eszterhas's steamy script.

Stone played Catherine Tramell, the crime writer who graduated magna cum laude in literature and psychology from Berkeley - a qualification treasured by fans as passionately as Bond buffs admire 007's degree in oriental studies from Cambridge - and who finds herself in the frame for kinky sex murders that resemble the plots of her novels. Hauled downtown for questioning, ice-cool Sharon opens her legs, revealing to sweaty cops that she has no underwear, and embarks on a cat-and-mouse sexual game with obsessed detective Michael Douglas, who in one notorious scene turns up at a raunchy nightclub with a lime-green V-necked jumper over his naked torso - perhaps the most horrifically unsexy moment in the history of men's fashion.
The original Basic Instinct had style, of a barking mad sort; Eszterhas's screenplay had its own beady-eyed narrative drive, and Stone created a classic character, displaying airy sang-froid as the adventuress exposing the men's prurience and hypocrisy. But what an incredible comedown this is. Thirteen years later, Catherine Tramell is now in London, and is going out with a footballer played by Stan Collymore, of all people. On the rebound from John Motson, perhaps. She kills him in the first scene in a sex-while-driving-a-sports-car incident - perhaps in blonde-solidarity revenge for the way he treated Ulrika Jonsson - and has to be interviewed by police psychiatrist David Morrissey, who gets ensnared by her wiles.
Will the legs-uncrossing minx once again disclose that she has not patronised the underpants department of Marks & Spencer? How will she up the gynaecological ante in 2006? Well, mercifully she doesn't, but the movie has no very interesting ideas about how to deflect or pre-empt this issue. Stone displays some frilly black pants in one scene and in another sits astride a designer chair in a possible reference to Christine Keeler. She gets fleetingly, gigglingly nude in a rooftop Jacuzzi, but given that we are in London, not California, this just looked a bit parky to me.
It is difficult to convey just how uproariously awful this movie is, all of the time. The original's complications had their own messy allure: this one is just muddled and silly. Sharon is haughtily jaded; there is nothing in the script to release her natural fizz; where once there was danger and mischief, there is now only a kind of dyspepsia, and the script by Leora Barish and Henry Bean gives no perspective on what Catherine might be like as an older woman. Morrissey looks thoroughly uncomfortable, especially when Sharon's teasing has to unleash his inner beast. It is then that that he gets very frowny and shouty and looks as cross as two sticks, like Gordon Brown, though not as sexy.
Charlotte Rampling plays Morrissey's shrink colleague, and nothing is made of her obvious talent to disturb, although she is given one of the most bizarre lines in the film. On being told that Catherine has disappeared from a drinks party she's hosting, Rampling tosses her head and says, with a little worldly sophisticated laugh: "She just walked out - how very Lacanian!" Oh yes! Ha! Lacanian! Very! Ha! If he hadn't died in 1981, Jacques Lacan could perhaps be brought on, like Marshall McLuhan in Annie Hall, to discuss this with Rampling.
And, please, what is it with the Swiss Re "gherkin" building? Why is it that every film set in London has to feature the gherkin? It used to be that London films had Routemasters sailing past the Palace of Westminster as their establishing shot. Now it's that bulbous, squat glass edifice poking up into the skyline as characters hurry in and out of cabs. Morrissey's office is actually in the gherkin, one of the most implausible sets I have ever seen, with its cross-diagonal struts visible on the windows overlooking the city. Why not have his office on the London Eye for Basic Instinct 3? Our poor capital city adds nothing to the film, and the film contributes nothing to London; it might as well be set on one of Jupiter's moons for all the atmosphere that is injected. Basic Instinct 2 resembles nothing so much as the toe-curling sex-obsession drama Killing Me Softly, another movie in which the UK is about as sexy as a pair of old Y-fronts.
The erotic thriller is a strange beast: somehow too brightly lit in 1980s neon to count as noir. My own theory is that successful thrillers already have their own subtextual cargo of eroticism: an "erotic thriller" always suffers from smut-overload. It may be that we can look forward to more sequels from the glory days. Body Heat 2? Fatal Attraction 2? Sea of Love 2? Basic Instinct was unusual, in that it permitted the femme fatale to remain alive for a sequel. Perhaps it is the erotic thriller itself to which Catherine Tramell's lethal ice-pick should be humanely applied.

adventuress- awanturnica
airy- przewiewny, chłodny
allure- pokusa, czar
beady-eyed- o świdrującym, pełnym złej woli spojrzeniu
buff- entuzjasta, znawca
bulbous- cebulkowaty, bulwiasty
cargo- ładunek
convey- wyrażać, przekazywać
deflect- odchylać, oddalać
disclose- ujawniać
display- okazywać, manifestować, przedstawiać
drive- napęd, energia
dyspepsia- niestrawność
edifice- gmach; struktura
embark (on)- brać w czymś udział
enforce - wprowadzać, narzucać
ensnare- usidlić, chwytać w sidła
expose- wystawiac, odsłaniać, demaskować
fizz- musowanie, syk, bulgot
fleetingly- przelotnie
frilly- z falbankami
frowny- z niezadowoloną, groźną miną
gherkin- korniszon
haughtily- arogancko, wyniośle
haul- holować, ciągnąć
jaded- znużony, znudzony
kinky- perwersyjny
lethal- śmiertelny
minx- figlarka, flirciara, bezczelna dziewczyna
muddled- pogmatwany
narrative- narracyjny, narratoski
notorious- powszechnie znany, o złej sławie
on the rebound- w złości, w rewanżu
overlook- wyglądać na, mieć widok na
parky- chłodny, rześki
patronise- być stałym klientem
poke- wtykać, wsadzać, wystawać
pre-empt- zapobiegać, udaremniać
prurience- żądza, lubieżność
raunchy- lubiezny, pożądliwy, sprośny
recede- cofać się, tracić na ważności
reference - nawiązanie
resemble- przypominać, być podobnym
sang-froid- zimna krew
smut- porno
sophisticated - wyrafinowany, wyszukany
strut- podpórka
subtextual- niedosłowny, między wierszami
teasing- drażnienie
toss- rzucać, odrzucać
treasure- cenić, przywiązywać wielką wagę
turn up- zjawiać się
unleash- spuszczać ze smyczy
uproariously- hałaśliwie, dosadnie
wile- sztuczka; wabik
worldly- światowy


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