Body Heat
Blu-ray – 1981
Directed by Lawrence Kasdan
Starring Kathleen Turner, William Hurt, Richard Crenna, Ted Danson, Mickey Rourke
Warner Bros Home Entertainment
Release Date: October 7, 2008

When Body Heat opens, our victim of love is on his balcony peering through the night at a fire from far away. The fire we learn is coming from an inn where Ned, the victim of love, used to eat when he was a young boy. He tells the hooker he hired for the night that his “history is burning up out there. Someone torched it to clear the lot.” He’s miserable and stunned that this has happened. By the film’s end, that restaurant burning will be meaningless because the history that this man will lose will be comparable to a fast-spreading forest fire; he won’t be able to do anything to prevent it.

This all happens because Ned’s love tries to encompass a woman who can’t be loved. There’s no question that Matty (Kathleen Turner) can feel love, but to be loved by her in return would be asking for too much. Right away after Ned (William Hurt) catches a glimpse of her, he falls under her spell. Then-first-time director Lawrence Kasdan makes it a point of recognition when she first appears on screen, drastically singling her out of a crowd. Hookers used to keep Ned busy and satisfied with his average life, but the spell that was cast upon him by Matty ignites a flame of love, passion and a strong willingness to her that can’t be extinguished. He works as a small-time lawyer dealing with small-time issues in a small-time town of Florida, which is suffering from a treacherous heat-wave. In a matter of time he finds himself involved in a case that towers over every case he has ever handled thanks to Matty.