Last year you may remember I lost control over both the book and the movie, 9 1⁄2 Weeks. I became obsessed with Elizabeth’s intense, sexual surrender and Mickey Rourke’s smile. I couldn’t believe this 1986 movie had just been sitting there my whole sexual awakening unwatched by me. I was ready to feel that again.
So I developed a new tradition called “Carolyn watches notable, hot, erotic thrillers of the past in the dead of winter” and this year I chose Basic Instinct.
Described as a neo-noir erotic thriller and starring Sharon Stone and Michael Douglas, I didn’t know much of anything about the movie except for, well, ::wink wink, nudge nudge::, you know. I never witnessed the infamous scene, and yet, I had seen it parodied in just about every way possible. I was excited to check this off my list.
But as I write about this movie a week later, it’s not that scene I’m thinking about. And it’s certainly not Sharon Stone’s character, author Catherine Tramell, either. The scene (which comes in around minute 27) is interesting, sure, but it’s also muddled by cheesy detective dialogue, the gurgle of a water cooler and the face of Wayne Knight aka Newman. It’s also pretty embarrassing how ‘shocking’ the detectives find Catherine’s carAAAzy habit of stripping emotion out of her sexual relationships.
That scene from Basic Instinct may be iconic but, for me, it takes a backseat to the other icon whose screen time exceeds that of Sharon Stone’s flesh. The icon that actually made me pause, rewind, and ask myself, “Did I really just see that? Did I really just see...a Bart Simpson keychain?”
Wait up.
Basic Instinct was released March 20, 1992. Six days later, only in it’s 3rd season, the 55th episode of The Simpsons, “Colonel Homer” aired. An episode with it’s own themes of seduction as the character of country singer, Lurleen Lumpkin, attempts to seduce Homer. But I’m not here to make symbolic Simpsons episodes connections between Basic Instinct (even if they do exist).
I’m obsessed with people who look and play the part of a quintessential ‘adult’ and, to me, Dr. Beth Garner, the character holding the keychain, is that. She’s involved in an intense sexual relationship with her client/colleague, she wears thigh highs and shoulder pads, she’s a freaking police psychologist and she storms into bars and tells her colleagues to “Fuck off!”
My adult experience has been that no matter how many bills I pay, no matter how much of a woman I become in the bedroom, no matter how many times I see the proof that I really am an adult, I’ll never look the part of a Dr. Beth. I constantly feel like the little girl who feels like she knows nothing, can’t sew a button, doesn’t understand the stock market (especially these days) and is easily intimidated by grown ups with families or a Master’s in Psychology.
But when Dr. Beth revealed to me that she kept her keys on a keychain with one of the most childish icons of my time, Bart freaking Simpson, it was the ‘Don’t have a cow’ moment I needed.
Like Dr. Beth Garner, my keys are also kept on my own silly piece of iconic, pop culture; a Pussy Wagon keychain. But I also own thigh highs, I’ve slept with with a colleague, and I think there’s a time and a place for shoulder pads. I don’t have a Master’s in Psychology but I pride myself on my communication skills that have led to some great conversations and, god dammit, I have a minor in Art!
The Beth and Bart sides that live in me are constantly battling for first place. Depending on what I’m trying to accomplish or who I’m talking to, they’re both always fighting to be understood and I’m pretty sure that’s just always how it’s going to go. My Beth side may never be as bright as my Bart side, but I know they’re both in me. And the less time I spend proving that to myself, the less exhausted I’ll be trying to prove myself to the world.
Uh, so yeah, Basic Instinct was a pretty okay movie.