Basic Instinct #2 does Poorly, Bush Blamed

And no, that is not a pun.

Erotic thrillers lose steam at box office

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - The last time "Basic Instinct" man-eater Catherine Tramell prowled the big screen, the studio erotic thriller was hitting box office heights. The first "Instinct" took the top spot when it debuted in 1992, with an opening weekend of $15.1 million, the equivalent of $20.45 million in today's dollars.

By comparison, "Basic Instinct 2" limped into 10th place upon its arrival this weekend, grossing just $3.2 million.

And why would that be?

Paul Verhoeven, director of the first "Basic Instinct" (which scored $353 million worldwide) as well as the widely ridiculed "Showgirls" (now regarded as something of a camp classic), attributes the genre's demise to the current American political climate.

"Anything that is erotic has been banned in the United States," said the Dutch native. "Look at the people at the top (of the government). We are living under a government that is constantly hammering out Christian values. And Christianity and sex have never been good friends."

Scribe Nicholas Meyer, who was an uncredited writer on 1987's seminal sex-fueled cautionary tale "Fatal Attraction," agrees, noting that the genre's downfall coincides with the ascent of the conservative political movement.

"We're in a big puritanical mode," he said. "Now, it's like the McCarthy era, except it's not 'Are you a communist?' but 'Have you ever put sex in a movie?'"

I'm sure that you all remember the recent Congressional hearings where large numbers of movie producers and directors were angrily asked "Have you ever put sex in a movie?", threatened with imprisonment in Branson, Missouri. [Note to liberals, this didn't really happen. - ed.]

Even rich liberals like these assume an entitlement for themselves. They believe that they are entitled to business success, and if they don't get it, it is the fault of the government (read GWB).

From Mere Comments, Erotic Thrillers Unexciting

What are these guys smoking? Who is chasing them? Christians--no, those nasty Puritans are back--are banning sex in the movies? Gads, sex not only in the movies, it's on prime-time television and cable, the internet--you don't have to go to the movies to see erotic thrills.

Has it every occurred to them that lust, after multiple viewings, isn't all that interesting? Maybe "pure" eroticism is just one-dimensional and boring? I mean, how much can you say about it? And is the following comment unintentionally admitting this?

Mark Damon, once dubbed the king of eroticism for producing such steamy classics as 1986's "9 1/2 Weeks" and 1990's "Wild Orchid," said he stopped producing sex-steeped dramas because "I didn't find any scripts that were worth producing. The genre had exhausted itself."

There is nothing there, it is just the same thing over and over again.

The problem that Paul Verhoeven and Nicholas Meyer have is that they are Leftists™ who cannot image that market forces have any effect on attendance. Sort of like not seeing an elephant in the living room.