An interesting deconstruction of the masculinity inherent to film noir with a cop antagonist who is a bully, a prick, and a rapist presented alongside a be-gay-do-crimes queer femme fatale who is a confident badass and successful novelist. The toxic masculinity and violent machismo of the police as repressive state apparatus is expressed through Nick’s (Michael Douglas) character while Catherine (Sharon Stone) expresses the liberation of queerness, sexual experimentation, and literary creativity. Stone gives a terrific performance in the shadow of Anthony Hopkins’ Hannibal Lecter. The film’s genre subversion is fatally undermined however by a third act where Catherine seems to genuinely fall for this awful man resulting in a hugely disappointing final scene where we see her put down the icepick while in bed with him.