Line #40 Film/FatalInstinct


1	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/1993_fatal_instinct_poster1.jpg]]
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3	''Fatal Instinct'' is a 1993 comedy film directed by Creator/CarlReiner that parodies erotic thrillers such as ''Film/FatalAttraction'', ''Film/BasicInstinct'', and ''Film/BodyHeat'', as well as other films such as ''Film/CapeFear'', ''Film/DoubleIndemnity'' and ''Film/SleepingWithTheEnemy''.
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5	The movie follows Ned Ravine (police officer '''and''' lawyer) who has an affair with a woman named Lola Cain. Ned's wife Lana and her auto mechanic Frank, whom she's having an affair with, start plotting to kill Ned in order to collect on his accident insurance. The film continues, following the ensuing antics involved.
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7	The film stars Creator/ArmandAssante as Ned, Creator/SeanYoung as Lola, Creator/KateNelligan as Lana, Creator/JamesRemar as Max Shady, and Creator/SherilynFenn as Laura Lincolnberry, Ned's secretary.
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9	Not to be confused with ''Film/FatalAttraction'' or ''Film/BasicInstinct'', though scenes from both do get lampooned in the film. Not to be confused with the 2014 Thriller of the same name involving two detectives trying to track down a serial killer of prostitutes.
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13	!!Tropes associated with this work:
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15	* AffectionateParody: "Femme Fatale" movies like ''Film/FatalAttraction'' and ''Film/BasicInstinct'', among others. It can be a little hard to take ''Film/DoubleIndemnity'' seriously after seeing this, as so much of the "[[FilmNoir hard-boiled]]" dialogue in ''Fatal Instinct'' was lifted directly from that.
16	* AsideGlance: Lola Cain, after Ned Ravine turns her down.
17	* BasicInstinctLegsCrossingParody: It lampoons the scene in its [[http://www.impawards.com/1993/fatal_instinct.html theatrical poster]], showing a woman sitting with her legs crossed and the tagline "Opening Soon".
18	* BetterThanABareBulb: Oh, so very much.
19	* TheBigBoard: Lana Ravine uses one to explain her murder plan.
20	* BigNo: Ned Ravine screams the obligatory "No!" when he fears that a jilted ex-lover boiled his skunk.
21	* BlondeBrunetteRedhead: The three principal female characters: blonde Lola, brunette Laura, and redhead Lana.
22	* BottomlessMagazines: Twice when Lana is firing her revolver. [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] during the courtroom scene.
23	* CameraAbuse: After Ned Ravine finds his skunk missing the camera follows him. As it does so it runs into a tree and the lens breaks.
24	* CarChase: Parodied. The cop/lawyer hero and a crook he arrests and represents chase each other down at a carnival with bumper cars.
25	* CatScare: Parodied. While Ned Ravine is searching his house for intruders he opens the medicine cabinet in his bathroom and discovers his cat inside it. The cat jumps out yowling.
26	* CollidingCriminalConspiracies: Both Ravine's unfaithful wife Lana and released convict Max Shady plot to kill him on the same train ride. Lana ends up shooting Shady by mistake because he also wears Ravine's trademark blue suit.
27	* ContrivedCoincidence: Ned doesn't see anything suspicious when, on the day he has to take a trip out of town, someone steals the engine of his car, forcing him to take the train, and minutes after he discovers this, the auto mechanic he fired a few days before shows up at his door, and is able to give him a lift to the train station.
28	* TheCoronerDothProtestTooMuch: Parodied with a murder scene where the cops think the victim killed himself with an electric drill. In the back. And the thing's still on.
29	* CostumeTestMontage: Ned Ravine takes his secretary Laura Lincolnberry to a store to buy her a gift and they both end up trying on women's clothes to the tune ''Brown Eyed Girl''.
30	* CueCard: Ned Ravine's partner holds up cards with MirandaRights written on them.
31	* DarkAndTroubledPast: Laura had been on the run from her abusive husband.
32	* DoubleEntendre: Parodied during Lola Cain's seduction of Ned Ravine, where their innuendo gets increasingly convoluted until it involves clone duplicates and dying in a house fire.
33	* FauxlosophicNarration: Parodied in-universe, with the protagonist's internal monologue being comprised of constant non-sequiturs, nonsensical analogies, and meaningless insights.
34	* FemmeFatale: Lola Cain and Lana Ravine.
35	* FieryRedhead: {{Averted}} by Lana; she's coldly calculating.
36	* FiveFiveFive: Lampshaded (like so many other tropes) by every phone number being 555-5555.
37	* FlashbackEcho: In a parody of ''Film/SleepingWithTheEnemy''. Twice when Laura Lincolnberry sees some disarranged towels, she has a flashback to her [[DomesticAbuse abusive husband]] getting angry at her because of his obsessive need for everything to be perfectly arranged, including towels.
38	* TheFool: Lawyer/cop Ned Ravine wanders blisfully through life as an ignorant buffoon, not noticing that several different people are all plotting his death.
39	-->'''Ned:''' I don't look as dumb as I am.
40	* FreudianThreat: In the backstory, Max Shady threatened to cut off his lawyer Ned Ravine's penis after Ravine lost Shady's case.
41	* FryingPanOfDoom: Laura Lincolnberry uses one to give her ex-husband a TapOnTheHead.
42	* FunWithSubtitles: Lana and Frank meet in the park to plot Ned's murder. They speak in Yiddish so no one can understand them, but an observer comments on their conversation, explaining that "I can read the subtitles."
43	* FunnyBackgroundEvent: At a murder scene the cops in the background keep falling over each other due to the amount of blood on the floor.
44	* GoingCommando: Lola Cain. When she puts both of her legs on a desk and presents herself to Ned Ravine (Armand Assante), he sees that she's bottomless under her white dress. So he gives her a pair of lacy, lilac, pop-up panties to wear.
45	* GroinAttack: Lana at the shooting range with a human-shaped target.
46	* HisAndHers: Parodied with those of Laura Lincolnberry and her abusive husband.
47	* HollywoodLaw: It would not be legal for a lawyer to defend someone he played a direct role in arresting, as this would be a conflict of interest. Fortunately, the film runs on RuleOfFunny.
48	* HollywoodSilencer: Parodied. When Max Shady test fires his silencer-equipped weapon in the train it makes a soft "fwip" as usual. He adjusts the silencer to "softer" and fires it again: this time it makes no noise at all.
49	* InnerMonologue: During dinner, Ned and Laura accidentally hear each other's thoughts. Then it turns into the Inner Dialogue.
50	* InsuranceFraud: Lana tries to kill her husband to collect on his life insurance and be able to shack up with her lover. But in order to maximize the insurance payout, she has to arrange for him to die under absurdly specific conditions: namely, that he be shot with a pistol, fall out of a northbound train, and land in a river.
51	* LadyInRed: Lola Cain, the FemmeFatale, appears in a red dress when she seduces Ned Ravine.
52	* LeftTheBackgroundMusicOn:
53	** During TheReveal that Lola and Lana [[spoiler: are sisters]].
54	** Whenever Lola is on screen there is usually a visible saxophone player in the background. Spoofed in a later scene where the sax is replaced by a trumpet (played by Doc Severinsen, no less!) because Clarence had the night off.
55	* LimitedWardrobe: Ned Ravine has a closet completely filled with identical blue suits. He asks his secretary which one he should wear. The secretary responds "The blue one".
56	* LookBothWays: While Ned is getting lost in one of his private monologues, he gets run over by a bus. He shrugs it off in the next scene.
57	* LowSpeedChase: Ned and the masked crook engage in one involving bumper cars.
58	* MadeOfIron: Max Shady at first doesn't seem to notice that Lana is shooting him.
59	* MediumAwareness: There are several such moments, including this interaction: "You speak Yiddish?" "No, but I can read the subtitles." - at which point, the two characters discussing the [[spoiler: murder/insurance fraud plot]] look down at their subtitles and FacePalm.
60	* MirandaRights: Ned Ravine reads them to a captured bank robber.
61	* MisplacedNamesPoster: See above. They got Kate Nelligan right, at least.
62	* MrExposition: Secretary Laura Lincolnberry explains the situation in great detail to her boss Ned Ravine.
63	* MurderByMistake: Lana Ravine and Max Shady [[CollidingCriminalConspiracies both attempt to kill Ned Ravine on a train ride]] (the former for her husband's life insurance, the latter for revenge). Lana ends up shooting Shady by mistake because he happens to be wearing the same blue suit as her husband, making them look sorta similar when viewed from the back.
64	* NameOfCain: Seriously, when you run into a FemmeFatale named "Lola Cain", don't be surprised that she's morally bankrupt.
65	* NewspaperThinDisguise: Max Shady (the escaped ex-con stalking Ned Ravine) does this several times. At least once his picture was on the front of the newspaper.
66	* OvercomeWithDesire: Ned breaks into Lana's house in a parody of a similar scene from ''Film/BodyHeat'' where the male protagonist, driven mad with lust for the FemmeFatale, breaks down a door to consummate their affair. [[SubvertedTrope Turns out he just forgot his car keys]].
67	* OvertRendezvous: Lana and Frank meet in a park to plot the death of Ned.
68	* ParodyNames: The main character, a lawyer/cop named Ned Ravine, is a take-off on William Hurt's character from ''Film/BodyHeat'', a lawyer named Ned Racine.
69	* PunchedAcrossTheRoom: Lola Cain to Ned Ravine after he calls her a "sure thing".
70	* RapidFireComedy
71	* TheReliableOne: Laura is this for Ned.
72	* SecondFaceSmoke: Spoofed via OverlyLongGag when the FemmeFatale keeps blowing smoke in the protagonist's face until he's covered by a layer of smog.
73	-->'''Ned Ravine:''' I think you smoke too much.
74	* {{Sexophone}}: A saxophone player actually follows the FemmeFatale around during her more sultry moments. Spoofed in a later scene where the sax is replaced by a trumpet (played by Doc Severinsen, no less!) because Clarence had the night off.
75	* ShoutOut: The title, to ''Film/BasicInstinct'' and ''Film/FatalAttraction.''
76	** Many within the dialogue and the plot.
77	* SmellySkunk: Averted; he's been descented.
78	* SpinningPaper: The headline for Lana Ravine's trial is introduced this way until Lola Cain yanks it out of the air.
79	* SpitefulSpit: Max Shady to Ned Ravine when he was found guilty.
80	* SuspiciouslySpecificDenial: Ned denying that he knows Lola.
81	* TapOnTheHead: Laura Lincolnberry knocks out her ex-husband by hitting him on the head with a FryingPanOfDoom.
82	* TattooedCrook: Spoofed by Max Shady. His prison tattoos include quotes by Pee Wee Herman and Bart Simpson, and mementos to remind him which of his hands is right or left.
83	* ThatPoorCat: Occurs twice: once when Laura Lincolnberry punches and breaks the cookie jar, and again when she shoots Lola Cain and Lana Ravine at the same time.
84	* ThatWasObjectionable: Spoofed during Lana Ravine's trial.
85	-->'''Prosecuting attorney:''' Your honor, I object! There's no reason for this trial to concern itself with the facts of the case!
86	* TurnInYourBadge: Ned throws his away in the climax and settles for just being a lawyer full time.
87	* UndersideRide: Max Shady hangs onto the underside of a vehicle while it drives along. When he gets out, it's revealed that friction with the roadway wore through his clothing, exposing his buttocks.
88	* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: The last the audience sees of Laura Lincolnberry's stalker ex-husband is him being knocked out by a TapOnTheHead with a frying pan. He clearly isn't killed by the attack, but the film doesn't say what happens to him.
89	* YiddishAsASecondLanguage: During the FunWithSubtitles scene.
90	* YouJustToldMe: Ned Ravine's secretary Laura Lincolnberry and the lipstick that wasn't on his collar.
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Context Film / FatalInstinct