The erotic thriller was a mainstay in the 1980s and early 1990s, infused with classic noir genre tropes and modern sexuality, allowed since the updated ratings system opened the door to more adult content. Brian De Palma was one of the first directors associated with the modern genre with Dressed to Kill (1980). A year later, The Empire Strikes Back scribe Lawrence Kasdan wrote and directed his own erotic noir, Body Heat (1981), which may very well be the most seductive thriller of all time. A great genre-defining movie, Body Heat is now available thanks to the coveted Criterion Collection, which has painstakingly remastered the film in 4K.
The story follows Ned (William Hurt), a local attorney who meets a sultry housewife (Matty), whose husband is only around on the weekends. The two begin a steamy romance and, in true noir fashion, decide to bump off the unwanted husband. The plot is reminiscent of Double Indemnity (1944), where an insurance salesman falls for a woman, and the two decide to kill her husband. In Body Heat, the protagonist is a lawyer, so he considers legal pitfalls — but such a torrid affair is sure to cloud his judgment.
Criterion’s New 4K Transfer is Delicious
The hot Florida landscape of Body Heat evokes Arthur Penn’s neo-noir Night Moves (1975), another sexually-infused Sunshine State crime caper. Criterion’s 4K upgrade intensifies the sun-drenched days and the sultry nights of sexcapades and double crosses, making viewers feel the heat throughout. The crisp visuals have the look and feel any celluloid purist covets, transporting us into an early 1980s theater.
The disc has an interview with Kasdan, which was conducted earlier this year, where the writer-director speaks about his career and how he began writing scripts at the University of Michigan. Honing his craft, Kasdan became enthralled with Hollywood’s noir films and enjoyed watching how the masters took basic plots and spun them up into enduring yarns. These films offered “feelings you don’t expect from one scene to another,” said Kasdan, while the characters are grounded in the deeply human “ability to screw yourself up to make your own disaster.”
Body Heat’s dialogue feels faithfully adapted from classic noirs. An early flirtatious scene has Matty telling Ned that her body runs warm, “Something about the engine,” she says. “Maybe you need a tune-up,” Ned responds. “Don’t tell me, you have just the right tool,” Matty playfully replies. The short scene is reminiscent of the wordplay in Double Indemnity (again), where the sexual metaphor revolves around getting a speeding ticket. Such wordplay is central to Body Heat, showing Kasdan’s love of Golden Age noir.
Looking at today’s Hollywood, Kasdan says that the “Technocrats have replaced the Jack Warners” by thinking they can engineer a successful film by way of algorithmic thinking. This is impossible, maintains Kasdan, who argues that a successful movie is built on the people who create it. Executives’ opinions are all “bluff,” he says. Body Heat was made by early-career dreamers, but had the technical mastery of an old pro, thanks to cinematographer Richard H. Kline, who knew how to make the many nighttime scenes shine.
‘Body Heat’ Holds Up After 45 Years
In many ways, Body Heat is a perfect genre film. It knows the rules, how to use them, and where to bend. Ned is the doomed protagonist, while Matty is the perfect noir spider-woman who weaves a meticulous web to serve her own interests. In the Criterion booklet for Body Heat, author Megan Abbott writes that if you’ve seen any classic noir, “you might anticipate the next move, and that’s part of the giddy thrill.” Abbott argues that the film can be read through the lens of Reagan’s ’80s, a decade of uncertainty, and a “deeper hunger” for the “future.” The film is full of self-reflection, characters looking into mirrors, and analyzing their actions. Body Heat “uses the vehicle of a sex-and-murder plot to deeply mine the anxieties of its current moment.”
The erotic thriller moved from low-budget production to the mainstream by the 1980s. Body Heat helped pave the way for a genre that was booming by the ’90s with now-classics like Basic Instinct (1992), Sliver (1993), The Last Seduction (1994), and Jade (1995). Its status as an erotic thriller masterpiece remains unchallenged.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
