In this series from Christian Pan, we hook back up with our favorite ex's--as in classic steamy movies worth a re-watch.
Body Heat (1981)
Starring: Kathleen Turner, William Hurt, Richard Crenna
Released: August 28, 1981 (USA)
Basic Plot: A small-time lawyer thinks he is helping a beautiful woman murder her husband so the two can run away together, but she has other plans.
In a tiny town in Florida, Ned Racine (William Hurt) is a lawyer with a reputation: sometimes, he´ll squeeze or bend the law to make it all fit, for him and his clients. Restless with women and hungry with ambition, he thinks he's going to enjoy some no-strings-attached sex when he meets the beautiful but married Matty Walker (Kathleen Turner). But when he discovers how rich her husband Edmund (Richard Crenna) is, and how badly Matty wants him dead, Racine thinks he's being the hero when he proposes murdering him, collecting the money from his estate, and then run away together. Too late, Racine discovers that Matty´s made him into the fall guy, and that this beautiful woman is far more cunning than he initially thought. As the cops get closer and closer to putting him in the frame, and as Matty continues to make her plans to take the money and run, will Racine be able to confront her in time?
Why Re-watch: After co-writing the screenplays for both Raiders of the Lost Ark and the Empire Strikes Back, Lawrence Kasdan made his directorial debut with the erotic-thriller Body Heat, which he also wrote. The influence of film noir can be felt throughout the movie, from the moody score composed by John Barry to the crackling dialogue, subtle symbolism in the visual vocabulary (the fog, shots of the spider web along with the wind chimes, Racine glimpsing the clown). Set in the South during an unexpected and exceptionally hot summer, few seem to be thinking straight due to the heat; “It's all emergency time,” Det. Oscar Grace (J.A. Preston) warns ominously at one point.
William Hurt had just completed a leading role in Ken Russell´s Altered States the previous year, but it was his portrayal as the crafty, ambitious, not too bright Ned Racine in Body Heat which propelled him to stardom. Hurt´s face is one of the most expressive on camera, allowing viewers to see him reflect, grow resentful, appear childish, and more. Plus, Hurt as Racine gets to play opposite Kathleen Turner as Matty, a striking performance when one considers this was her film debut at 27. Turner is unafraid to be ruthless, frankly sexual, and cunning. In true film noir fashion, her Matty Walker is a brilliant femme fatale.
As a thriller, the plot of Kasdan´s script brims with a number of suspenseful twists that will leave viewers satisfied, while also maintaining an appropriately languid atmosphere amidst the scorching heat for the characters to exist within. But as the title implies, Body Heat is also about the carnal hunger between Matty & Racine, and there are a number of erotic scenes that will keep viewers warm. Under Kasdan´s direction, Turner and Hurt completely commit themselves–not only to these characters, but especially to the scenes where they express their primal desires and have sex. The two have all sorts of sweaty sex in this film, including brief frontal nudity from both actors. Especially when this is so rare in mainstream films today, it´s exceptionally impressive to think that Body Heat was this bold and direct in its appetite more than forty years ago.
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