Basic Instinct is a 1992 American erotic thriller film directed by Paul Verhoeven and written by Joe Eszterhas, and starring Michael Douglas and Sharon Stone
Basic Instinct establishes Tramell (Sharon Stone) as a successful crime novelist who is connected to the violent stabbing death of a rock musician, Johnny Boz. She is investigated by San Francisco homicide detectives Nick Curran (Michael Douglas) and Gus Moran (George Dzundza), who learn that Boz died in exactly the same manner as a character in Tramell's most recent novel. Tramell shows little emotion upon hearing of Boz's death and, under questioning by the police, behaves provocatively; in the film's most famous scene, Tramell re-crosses her legs to show that she isn't wearing underwear beneath her short skirt.
Curran looks into Tramell's troubled history and links her to the deaths of her parents, her counselor at UC Berkeley, and her former fiancé; she also has a habit of befriending imprisoned murderers. However, when he confronts Tramell, she taunts him with knowledge of his drug addiction. Thinking that Tramell received the confidential information from an adversarial Internal Affairs investigator, Marty Nilsen, a violent Curran gets himself suspended and falls into a drunken stupor. After Nilsen is found dead, he becomes the prime suspect. Curran, increasingly seduced by Tramell, becomes sexually involved with her; she tells him that he will be the basis of the character in her next novel.
Tramell's lesbian lover, Roxy, unsuccessfully attempts to kill Curran and dies in a car crash. Tramell's apparent grief over Roxy's death leads Curran to doubt her guilt. Curran then learns that as a college student, Tramell had a lesbian encounter with Beth Garner, a police psychologist he previously had an affair with. Upon finding the manuscript to Tramell's latest novel, Curran realizes that Moran is in danger; he is too late to stop Moran's apparent murder by Garner, whom he shoots when he