Instinct (film)

Plot

The film examines the mind of anthropologist Ethan Powell (Hopkins) who had been missing for a few years, living in the jungle with gorillas. He is convicted of killing and injuring several supposed Wilderness Park Rangers in Africa, and is sent to prison. A bright young psychiatrist, Theo Caulder (Gooding), tries to find out why he killed them, but becomes entangled in a quest to learn the true history and nature of humankind. Eventually it is revealed that during the course of Powell's stay with the gorillas, they accepted him as part of their group; he was attempting to protect his gorilla family when the rangers arrived and started shooting them. He gets a hearing to reveal the truth, but an attack by a vicious guard on the other prisoners causes Powell to be reminded of the killed gorillas and stop talking again. At the end of the film, Powell escapes from prison using a pen to dig out the lock on a window, and heads back to Africa.

Cast

Reception

The film received mostly mixed reviews. Review aggregator Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, states the film received an average score of 43 based on 23 reviews. Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a critic score of 27% and an audience score of 67%. The film was also a box office bomb, grossing only $34,105,207 in the United States and Canada. The film won a Genesis Award for its themes of animal rights. On the day of the premier for this film in Orlando, FL, Cuba Gooding, Jr. added his handprints to a star outside of the Chinese Theater at MGM Studios, a park at Walt Disney World. This walk of fame is a replica of the famous Walk of Fame in Hollywood, CA.

Soundtrack

1. "Main Title"
2. "Into the Wild"
3. "Back to the Forest"
4. "Everybody Goes"
5. "The Killing"
6. "The Riot"
7. "Escape"
8. "End Credits"