Basic Instinct (1992,
dir: Paul Verhoeven)
Sharon Stone, Michael Douglas, George
Dzundza
NORTHERN CALIFORNIA
Despite attacks by gay groups, I get the feeling that there was a
well-intentioned script here once, reversing the standard
woman-in-peril slasher cliche by setting up a clutch of murderous women
and male victims. However, by wrapping the idea in a Hitchcock pastiche,
it comes over as a confused piece of homophobic misogyny. Maybe a female
director could have got it right?
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Although a hothouse, coke-snorting LA setting seems needed, Verhoeven films
in a Vertigoesque San Fransisco, with Sharon Stone sporting the
inappropriate
Hitch uniform of sexual repression, all tightly-clenched hair and severe grey
suit. Michael Douglas deserts the Evian, after grilling Stone, at Tosca
Cafe, a pricey media persons' hangout at 242 Columbus Avenue in the heart of the downtown
district. The 'Stetson Bar' is Raw Hide II,
280 Seventh Street, south of Market, a real lesbian C&W bar in San Fran, though
the exterior and the next-door diner are fronts constructed in a deserted alley
beneath the Transbay Terminal Deck |
Tosca Cafe,
242 Columbus Avenue,
San Francisco |
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Filming also in Rohnert Park and Petaluma (the Northern California town where
American Graffiti
was filmed); and at Marin County's Dominican College. The Police HQ where Stone
does for knickers what Clark Gable did for vests, filmed at Warners in Hollywood,
as did Johnny Boz's churchified rock club - a set based on NYC's Limelight Club.
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The chase filmed up Kearney Street's steep
sidewalk steps on Telegraph Hill. Douglas lives at 1158
Montgomery Street. Sharon Stone's swish pad is
supposedly at 'Stinson', a swanky beachside community north of San Fran, but
actually filmed to the south at a beachfront estate on a rocky bluff in Carmel
Heights (which is why it seems to be reached via the Bixby Bridge, which
is way to the south of San Francisco on Highway 1, California's Big Sur coastline) |
1158 Montgomery Street,
San Francisco |
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Any queries, mistakes or further information: locator555@aol.com
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