Basic Instinct is an American thriller film that was released in 1992 and was written by Joe Eszterhas and directed by Paul Verhoeven. On the starring cast were Michael Douglas, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Sharon Stone, George Dzundza and Leilani Sarelle. It is about 123 minutes long and was first released in the US, UK and Australia.

The main star is a police detective Nick Curran (Douglas) who is probing the case in which a wealthy former singer was brutally murdered. Catherine Tramell (Sharon) is a beautiful and seductive novelist who is involved in the case. But ironically Detective Curran gets romantically involved with Catherine and together they have a mind blowing and passion-filled relationship. Detective Curran only comes to find out later that she is actually very dangerous. The Scotland Yard then replaces him with psychiatrist Dr. Michael Glass who like Detective Curran is entranced by Catherine and falls for her seductive tricks.

However, Basic Instinct did not receive a round of applause from everybody as it was marred with a lot of controversies even prior to its release. Gay rights activists were against the way it depicted homosexual relationships. They argued that the bisexual and lesbian women featured in the film were shown to be psychopathic serial killers.

But despite the controversy surrounding the film, it became a major box office hit by making a whooping $353 million thus  becoming one of the most successful films in the 90s.  The success story did not end there as it got nominated for two prestigious awards; Academy Award and Golden Globe. Sharon Stone was also nominated for the Best Actress award in the Golden Globe.

Other versions have subsequently been released though most of them have been a total flop. The most recent release was in 2006. However, the original film received an ‘Excellent Rating’ from the viewers.