Basic Instinct

>> Another ad campaign mis-sells the movie

by EMRU TOWNSEND

Every so often the moviegoing public is reminded that the people who make trailers don't always have the same mandate as the director of the actual film. Such is the case with Instinct, which, going by the TV ads, features a feral Anthony Hopkins attacking anything that moves, a terrified Cuba Gooding, Jr., and Donald Sutherland looking concerned.

Here's the official notice: don't believe the hype. Granted, there are times when Hopkins beats the crap out of someone, and there are times when Gooding is terrified. Sutherland looks concerned throughout most of the movie, so we can't fault the ads for that.

What the ads don't tell you is that Anthony Hopkins' character, Ethan Powell, is a doctor--a primatologist, in fact, who disappeared while studying gorillas in Rwanda, only to resurface in a Rwandan prison, charged for the murder of two men. Ben Hillard (Sutherland) is the psychiatrist assigned to determine whether or not the extradited Powell is insane, but he hands the case over to Theo Caulder (Gooding), his hotshot student.

The parallels to Silence of the Lambs present themselves immediately. Hopkins plays a doctor locked away in an institution for the criminally insane, while a zealous youngun' mentally fences with him in order to unravel a life-or-death mystery. It quickly becomes clear, however, that Hopkins isn't insane. If anything, his time among the gorillas has made him the clearest-thinking member of the entire cast. And unlike Jodie Foster's Clarice Starling, Gooding's Caulder is on a quest for the contents of Powell's mind, not some serial killer.

Also unlike Foster, Gooding doesn't quite hold his own against Hopkins. Hopkins plays Powell with the same intensity as he did Hannibal Lecter, while also exuding compassion and understanding; Gooding's Caulder, who is supposed to be experiencing self-realization as he becomes more involved with Powell, isn't quite as convincing. Gooding plays him as too much of a cipher for us to really feel the transformation. We're told that he's something of a careerist and that he changes as the movie goes on, but we pretty much have to take their word for it.

Still, there have been weaker links. Director Jon Turteltaub's skillful depiction of Powell's past in Rwanda and his present incarceration are thought-provoking enough to more than make up for Gooding's wooden performance. Overall, Instinct is a compelling, thoughtful movie; it's too bad someone didn't feel confident enough to market it that way.

Instinct opens Friday, June 4