'Instinct' gives primal fears

By Ruth Williams
Summer Forty-Niner

Academy Award winners Cuba Gooding Jr. and Anthony Hopkins return to the big screen in “Instinct.”

The story takes place in the Rwandan jungle where Ethan Powell (Anthony Hopkins), renown anthropologist, is studying the silver-back gorillas.  After months of observation, the male gorilla allows Powell to join his clan.

Events change when three of the gorillas are gunned down by Rwandan hunters.  Powell, following his instinct to protect his new family, beats two of the hunters to death with a wooden club.

Powell is imprisoned for a year and transported back to America where a psychological evaluation may be his ticket to freedom.

Powell’s case piques the interest of Dr. Theo Caulder (Cuba Gooding Jr.).  Caulder sees this as an opportunity to advance his career in the world of psychiatry.  During the sessions, Powell teaches Caulder lessons about humans, control and power that he will never forget.