Instinct (1999)
Director: Jon Turtletaub Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Cuba Gooding Jr., Donald Sutherland, Maura Tierney, George Dzundza Screenplay: Gerald Di Pego (based on the novel by Daniel Quinn) Producers: Barbara Boyle, Michael Taylor Runtime: US Distribution: Buena Vista Pictures Rated R: Violence
Copyright 1999 Nathaniel R. Atcheson
You know, I never really wondered what the Tarzan films would have been like had Tarzan been an old man. While watching Instinct, I couldn't help but acknowledge the way the film carelessly rehashes the well-explored themes of those earlier movies. Even beside the Tarzan comparison, Instinct just isn't a very good film. It's painfully idealistic, manipulative, and silly. I didn't hate it -- it's simply impossible for me to hate any film starring Anthony Hopkins; furthermore, most of the acting is quite good. But I can recognize Instinct for what it is beyond my subjective admiration for the actors involved. I can also recognize reasons for wanting to make Instinct, and it's pretty clear that this could have been a good film with a massive script overhaul and a director less interested in imitating movies like Patch Adams.
Things start off in the predictable way, as director Jon Turtletaub introduces us to our hero, Theo Caulder (Cuba Gooding, Jr.), an ambitious, young psychiatrist under the supervision of an experienced, old psychiatrist (Donald Sutherland). Caulder soon finds himself involved in the case of his life, the one he thinks will make him famous. The subject is Ethan Powell (Hopkins), an anthropologist who has been living among gorillas in Africa for the past two years. Powell has been charged with the brutal murders of several men in Africa, and it's now Caulder's job to find out of he's mentally competent enough to stand trial. Through a series of short sessions, Caulder tries to put together the complex psyche of Powell.
Even though it really is an old man version of Tarzan, much of this central idea is rather interesting. As I said, Hopkins is captivating for every second he's on screen; he has a way of convincing us that he's not acting, that he's actually a man who has just spent two years of his life living with a family of wild gorillas. The character himself isn't very interesting -- he's just an anthropologist who really likes gorillas -- but Hopkins makes him interesting with subtleties both in speech and action. Gooding Jr. does strong work opposite Hopkins, playing Caulder as an intelligent and flawed individual. The screenplay, written by Gerald Di Pego and "suggested by" a novel by Daniel Quinn, gives us no background information on Caulder, but that seems to be the point (he has no time for friends because he's obsessed with his work). Nonetheless, these two actors are essentially the entire list of things that are good about Instinct.
Unfortunately, filmmaking this inept can mangle the effect of even the best acting. Turtletaub and Di Pego are both guilty of Instinct's artistic failure, for they work together to make the dumbest, most cliche-ridden environment in which their characters are to live, and they do so by means of brainless subplots. First, we have the prison warden subplot. The prison warden is evil and wants to stop Caulder's progress at any cost; if this means taking Caulder off the Powell case, then that's fine. There's also the prison guard subplot. The prison guard is played by John Ashton; the prison guard seems to enjoy mercilessly beating upon the psychotics under his supervision, and he's instrumental in helping the story along to its obvious conclusion. Then there's the daughter subplot, in which Maura Tierney (playing the daughter) must look very upset a lot of the time; after all, she is the daughter of a deranged man.
If some of this stuff sounds familiar, that's because they're all devices that have been used and reused in countless other films. The evil doctor in Patch Adams is not unlike the evil warden here. The offensive caricatures of mental patients lack the depth that the similar portrayals in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest had. Ashton's evil prison guard pales in comparison to Clancy Brown's in The Shawshank Redemption. Hopkins' performance will undoubtedly remind audiences of his turn in The Silence of the Lambs. And then there's the whole Tarzan thing, which is more than a little bit obvious through the entire film.
Perhaps what irritates me most about Instinct is the half-hearted attempt at philosophical depth. The message Powell brings back from the wild is not a subtle one: he thinks that humans are "takers," that they expand and kill and that we should all just live like gorillas. I can sympathize with that, but only when it's in a compelling film. This is the kind of stupid movie -- just like Patch Adams -- in which a big group of characters (psychotic inmates, in this case) rise against the evil forces oppressing them by tearing up playing cards. What does any of this have to do with a man who has just spent two years of his life with gorillas? If all the subplots of Instinct had been left on the cutting room floor, we would have had a thirty-minute movie far superior to the two-hour one that I watched today. If the central idea had been developed beyond the Old Man Tarzan premise, then we would really have had something interesting -- a movie that doesn't rely on the strength of its actors.
Psychosis Rating: 4/10
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Nathaniel R. Atcheson
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