Main Cast: William Hurt, Kathleen Turner, Richard Crenna, Ted Danson, J.A. Preston, Mickey Rourke
Release Year: 1981
Country: US
Run Time: 113 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Plot
Lawrence Kasdan's first directorial effort is a throwback to the early days of film noir. The scene is a beastly hot Florida coastal town, where naive attorney Ned (William Hurt) is entranced by the alluring Matty (Kathleen Turner in her film debut). Ned is manipulated into killing Matty's much older husband (Richard Crenna), the plan being that Ned's knowledge of legal matters will enable both conspirators to escape scott-free. This might have been the case, had not Matty been infinitely craftier than the cloddish Ned. Just when it seems as though the film has run out of plot twists, we're handed yet another surprise. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
It's very warm in the stuffy interiors of this thinly disguised remake of Double Indemnity. Kathleen Turner is so sultry in this Deep South film noir potboiler that it's hard to imagine that this was her first starring role. She plays a devious wife who spins a web that traps a naïve, mesmerized lawyer (William Hurt) in a scheme to kill her husband. Writer-director Lawrence Kasdan, in his directorial debut, keeps the suspense and eroticism at full power, with plot twists aplenty. He expertly uses the heat of the coastal Florida milieu; the film practically sweats. The film launched the careers of Turner and Kasdan and jump-started a noir revival. Ted Danson, Mickey Rourke, and Richard Crenna provide solid support. Kasdan, Turner, and Hurt reunited in 1988 for The Accidental Tourist. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide
Kim Zimmer - Mary Ann Simpson; Jane Hallaren - Stella; Lanna Saunders - Roz Kraft; Carola McGuinness - Heather Kraft; Michael Ryan - Miles Hardin; Larry Marko - Judge Costanza; Lynn Hallowell - Angela; Deborah Lucchessi - Beverly; Meg Kasdan - Nurse; Thom Sharp - Michael Glenn; Robert Traynor - Prison Trustee
Credit
Robert Grand - Associate Producer, Wallis Nicita - Casting, Renie Conley - Costume Designer, Michael Grillo - First Assistant Director, Lawrence Kasdan - Director, Carol Littleton - Editor, John Barry - Composer (Music Score), Michael McGowan - Camera Operator, Bill Kenney - Production Designer, Richard H. Kline - Cinematographer, Jiri Macak - Cinematographer, Robert Grand - Production Manager, Fred T. Gallo - Producer, Lawrence Kasdan - Producer, George Lucas - Producer, Rick T. Gentz - Set Designer, Richard McKenzie - Set Designer, Sig Tingloff - Set Designer, Howard Jensen - Special Effects, Hal Bigger - Special Effects, Steve Chambers - Stunts, Gary Combs - Stunts, James M. Halty - Stunts, Lawrence Kasdan - Screenwriter, Vaclav Matejka - Screenwriter, Milan Steindler - Screenwriter
Ned Racine, an inept and rather sleazy Floridalawyer, becomes entangled with Matty Walker, a ruthless femme fatale who is plotting to murder her wealthy husband Edmund and collect his entire estate.
Racine's lust for Matty is such that he agrees to help her commit the murder. He enlists the help of one of his shadier clients, Teddy Lewis, an expert on incendiary devices, to help him cover up the crime.
All seems to have gone well until an unknown person begins feeding the prosecutor's office bits of incriminating evidence. Reluctantly, Racine's best friends, soft-shoe-dancing District Attorney Peter Lowenstein and police detective Oscar Grace, begin to follow the guilty couple's trail.
The story has a compelling twist at the end.
Quotes
Lowenstein: "Ned, someday your dick is going to lead you into a very big hassle."
-- Matty: "You aren't too smart, are you? I like that in a man."
-- Ned: "What else do you like? Lazy? Ugly? Horny? I got 'em all."
The film received positive reviews when it was released in 1981, and it currently has a 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Most reviewers, like Roger Ebert, compared the film favorably to film noir of the past:
Yes, Lawrence Kasdan's Body Heat (1981) is aware of the films that inspired it--especially Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity (1944). But it has a power that transcends its sources. It exploits the personal style of its stars to insinuate itself; Kael is unfair to Turner, who in her debut role played a woman so sexually confident that we can believe her lover (William Hurt) could be dazed into doing almost anything for her. The moment we believe that, the movie stops being an exercise and starts working.
As mentioned by Ebert, film criticPauline Kael dismissed the film, citing its "insinuating, hotted-up dialogue that it would be fun to hoot at if only the hushed, sleepwalking manner of the film didn't make you cringe or yawn."
