Basic Instinct. They blow it in the last act. I guess Verhoeven was trying to out-Hitchcock Hitchcock. Instead he fell short. In the end the audience manipulation, the did-she-or-didn't-she stuff, is just manipulation for its own sake, done because he can, and you don't really give a damn because, well, it's just a movie. It is, I'll allow, engaging until near the end. I suppose Verhoeven and Eszterhas saw themselves as colleagues of the Sharon Stone character in the manipulation business. As for her, self-exposure as part of an overall strategy of self-concealment is her game, and she's a master of it. In the matter of nudity she's the opposite of Marion Crane. Undressed to kill, not to die, and she's a hell of a lot smarter than Norman Bates.