Sliver 1993,

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Until I am told differently, I am going to assume that one rule of thumb that Hollywood screenwriters usually try to follow when they create whodunits, is a suspect list of more than two persons. Unfortunately, Sliver's screenwriter, Joe Eszterhas, likes to be an individual and, whenever possible, it seems that he tries to write scripts that deliberately go against the grain of whatever standards, or unwritten rules the great majority of modern screenwriters follow. This is true of the other Sharon Stone Sex Festival Movie, Basic Instinct, and is definitely true in the case of Sliver.

Sliver's plot is simple: young beautiful women in a New York City apartment building are being killed. We are supposed to care. Ms. Stone stars as a book editor who has just moved into the aforementioned building from hell. The one intriguing idea in Sliver comes when we learn that the owner of the high rise has somehow managed to install closed circuit cameras in all the rooms of all the apartments of the building, creating a perversely voyeuristic world for himself. While this is unbelievable at best, the notion is enchanting. Watching other people's lives definitely is entertainment, an idea that the makers of The Truman Show have capitalized on fully. Alfred Hitchcock agreed that all people are voyeurs to some degree, whether they'd admit it or not, and such is how the film industry--an industry based on following the events occurring in other people's lives--became the billion dollar giant it is today. Hitchcock created several films, Rear Window being the most notable, that were firmly based off this 'peeping tom' idea. However, the parallels between Rear Window and Sliver end there.

In addition to the element of voyeurism that we are served, we are forced to watch Billy Baldwin and Tom Berenger via for Stone's romantic attention, Stone putt golf balls in her apartment sans pants, and learn more about the on-going series of gruesome murders in which Baldwin and Berenger are the prime, and only, suspects.

One component of Basic Instinct that isn't really carried over to this film is the prominence of Stone's God given attributes. Although there is lots of acrobatic sex in just about every type of room you could imagine, Stone's body isn't as obviously on displa.html>spla.html>spla.html>spla.html>splay. Whether this is a positive or a negative is for you to decide.

There is a definitive ending in Sliver though. Director John McTiernan, choosing not to raise the questions that Paul Verhoeven raised with his "did she, or didn't she?" ending in Basic Instinct, does show the viewer who the criminal is. Then the movie ends. Motive and opportunity and reason are not explored at all, as the face of the murderer is revealed. If this sounds slightly off-kilter, please bear in mind that this is the SECOND ending they filmed for Sliver. The original ending, of which I know nothing, was criticized by the test audiences as if it were Hudson Hawk, and thus McTiernan and company went back to re-shoot a more satisfying (?) ending. If this was the conclusion they put in, I can't imagine how pathetic the original must have been.

Sliver tickles our fascination with its voyeuristic qualities, but never does anything else to make this film anything above sub-par. If you have to see one of the Sharon Stone Sex Festival Movies, see Basic Instinct.