page_title: Paul Verhoeven
section_title: Filmmaking in the United States (1983–2000)
hierarchical_section_title: Paul Verhoeven / Career / Filmmaking in the United States (1983–2000)
caption_attribution_description: English: Presentation of the film Basic Instinct at the Cannes film festival. Left from right&#160;: stars Jeanne Tripplehorn and Michael Douglas, Paul Verhoeven's wife Martine Tours, director Paul Verhoeven, star Sharon Stone and producer Mario Kassar Français&#160;: Présentation du film Basic Instinct au festival de Cannes. De gauche à droite&#160;: les acteurs Jeanne Tripplehorn et Michael Douglas, Martine Tours (épouse du réalisateur), le réalisateur Paul Verhoeven, l'actrice Sharon Stone et le producteur Mario Kassar
context_page_description: Paul Verhoeven is a Dutch director, screenwriter and film producer active in both the Netherlands and Hollywood. Verhoeven's blending of graphic violence and sexual content with social satire are trademarks of both his drama and science fiction films. He directed the films Turkish Delight, Keetje Tippel, Soldier of Orange, Spetters, The Fourth Man, Flesh and Blood, RoboCop, Total Recall, Basic Instinct, Showgirls, Starship Troopers, Hollow Man, Black Book and Elle.
  Turkish Delight received the award for Best Dutch Film of the Century at the Netherlands Film Festival. His films altogether received a total of nine Academy Award nominations, mainly for editing and effects. Verhoeven won the Saturn Award for Best Director for RoboCop. His Dutch war film Black Book was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language and was voted by the Dutch public, in 2008, as the best Dutch film ever made. In contrast, he won the Golden Raspberry Awards for Worst Picture and Worst Director for Showgirls; he is one of the few people to have accepted their Golden Raspberry awards in person, and was the first person to go to the ceremony to receive it.
context_section_description: Gerard Soeteman also wrote the script for Verhoeven's first English-language film, Flesh and Blood (1985), which starred Rutger Hauer and Jennifer Jason Leigh. Verhoeven moved to Hollywood for a wider range of opportunities in filmmaking. Working in the U.S., he made a serious change in style, directing big-budget, violent, special-effects-heavy hits RoboCop and Total Recall⁠—each of which won an Academy Special Achievement Award: RoboCop for Sound Effects Editing, and Total Recall for Visual Effects, .
  Verhoeven followed those successes with the equally intense and provocative Basic Instinct (1992), an erotic thriller. The ninth-highest-grossing film of the year, the movie was a return to themes Verhoeven had explored in Turkish Delight and The Fourth Man. The film's most notorious scene shows Sharon Stone's character in a police interrogation, where she uncrosses her legs, briefly revealing her vulva (she does not wear underwear underneath her skirt). The film received two Academy Awards nominations, for Film Editing and for Original Music.
  During this time, Verhoeven also worked on creating an historical epic based around the Crusades that would have starred Arnold Schwarzenegger. The film entered pre-production in 1993, but a year later the studio backing the film (Carolco) pulled funding for the project. Verhoeven would continue to discuss the film throughout the 1990s.
  Verhoeven's next film was the poorly received, NC-17 rated Showgirls (1995), about a stripper in Las Vegas trying to make a career as a showgirl. The film won seven Golden Raspberry Awards including Worst Film and Worst Director; Verhoeven became the first director to accept his "award" in person. Afterward, the film enjoyed success on the home video market, generating more than $100 million from video rentals and became one of MGM's top 20 all-time bestsellers.
  After Basic Instinct and Showgirls, Verhoeven returned to the science fiction, graphic violence and special-effects tropes that had marked his earlier films with Starship Troopers (1997), loosely based on the novel of the same name by Robert A. Heinlein, and Hollow Man (2000). Each film received an Academy Award nomination for Best Visual Effects.
caption: Presentation of Basic Instinct at the 1992 Cannes Film Festival. Left to right: Jeanne Tripplehorn, Michael Douglas, Martine Tours (Verhoeven's wife), Verhoeven, Sharon Stone and Mario Kassar
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