Review of Instinct (1999) by Alison O — 29 Feb 2004

[size=3]Having risen to stardom playing a bloodthirsty cannibal in [i]The Silence of the Lambs[/i], it was perhaps inevitable that Anthony Hopkins would choose to once again delve into the mind of a killer removed from society. However, in Jon Turteltaub's thriller [i]Instinct[/i], Hopkins doesn't play an entirely unsympathetic killer: his victims are gorilla-poachers, and they don't really count as human, do they? Hopkins plays Dr. Powell (why are doctors played by Hopkins always so deadly?), a man who has immersed himself in gorilla culture and, at the time he is imprisoned in a mental institution for the murders, seems to have completely withdrawn from any human interaction. Cuba Gooding Jr. plays a young psychiatrist, Theo Caulder, who believes he can crack the impenetrable Powell and find out what made him snap. What could have been an interesting psychological thriller is in fact nothing more than a vehicle for Hopkins to stare menacingly from behind strands of his wild hair, and Gooding Jr. to earnestly try to understand Powell's pro-nature point-of-view. For a thriller, [i]Instinct [/i]is surprisingly concerned with appearing gentle and inoffensive: in addition to the commendable theme of man respecting nature, we are also treated to subplots that remind us that all mental patients should be treated humanely. [i]Instinct [/i]spreads itself so thin that it ends up undermining its own effectiveness on the basic level of entertainment. It is difficult to care about the characters when the actors are so over-the-top and the direction is so heavy-handed. [i]Instinct [/i]is not even really a thriller, and it is certainly not one that depends on psychological motivations. It is a nonsensical mess of a film, redeemed only by Hopkins, and by Donald Sutherland in a supporting role. One would think that a film that contained elements of [i]One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Gorillas in the Mist [/i]and [i]The Silence of the Lambs [/i]would be mildly interesting. One should think again...[/size].

[size=3][/size].

[size=3](BASIC) [/size].