Body Heat (1981) 34 pages
Body Heat — Index
The wiki for Lawrence Kasdan's Body Heat (1981). Hub: Body Heat (1981).
Plot
- Plot Summary (Body Heat) — full narrative, every plot fact cited to a backbeat
- Plot Structure (Body Heat) — the film mapped through the Two Approaches framework
- Backbeats (Body Heat) — the film in 43 numbered beats
Cast
- Cast and Characters (Body Heat) — cast table, character notes, and Kasdan's casting argument
- William Hurt — Ned Racine
- Kathleen Turner — Matty Walker (debut)
- Richard Crenna — Edmund Walker
- Ted Danson — Peter Lowenstein
- J.A. Preston — Det. Oscar Grace
- Mickey Rourke — Teddy Lewis
Production
- Production History (Body Heat) — development, casting, shoot, post, release
- Lawrence Kasdan (Body Heat) — director and screenwriter
- Richard H. Kline — cinematographer
- John Barry — composer
- Kathleen Turner's Debut — Turner's first film, the audition story
- The Censorship Battle — the X-to-R cut history
- Kasdan and the Lucasfilm-Spielberg Connection — how the film got made
Analysis & Reception
- Themes and Analysis (Body Heat) — short navigator to the longer essays
- Critical Reception and Legacy (Body Heat) — opening reviews, awards, reappraisal
- Physical Media Releases (Body Heat) — VHS through 4K UHD
Essays
Signature scenes
- The Window-Smashing Entrance — the porch break-in (inciting incident)
- The Glasses Switch — the second escalation's first piece of evidence
- The Boathouse Fire — the climax (scene write-up)
- The Boathouse Fire Climax (Body Heat) — climax-skill page: the fireball as audience-certainty moment
- The Beach Ending — the closing tropical-beach shot
Tech / craft
- Richard Kline's Heat-Soaked Florida Look — the cinematography as argument
- John Barry's Saxophone Score — the score as Matty's voice
- Kasdan's Patience with Setup — how the back-half payoffs are planted in the front half
Lineage
- Double Indemnity and the Femme Fatale Tradition — Body Heat as Cain restaged
- The 1981 Noir Revival — Body Heat and the Postman remake
- Kasdan and the Lucasfilm-Spielberg Connection — financing and trust
Era / setting
- Florida Heat as Atmosphere — the heat as moral solvent
All Pages
- Backbeats (Body Heat)
- Body Heat (1981)
- Cast and Characters (Body Heat)
- Critical Reception and Legacy (Body Heat)
- Double Indemnity and the Femme Fatale Tradition
- Florida Heat as Atmosphere
- J.A. Preston
- John Barry
- John Barry's Saxophone Score
- Kasdan and the Lucasfilm-Spielberg Connection
- Kasdan's Patience with Setup
- Kathleen Turner
- Kathleen Turner's Debut
- Lawrence Kasdan (Body Heat)
- Mickey Rourke
- Physical Media Releases (Body Heat)
- Plot Structure (Body Heat)
- Plot Summary (Body Heat)
- Production History (Body Heat)
- Richard Crenna
- Richard H. Kline
- Richard Kline's Heat-Soaked Florida Look
- Ted Danson
- The 1981 Noir Revival
- The Beach Ending
- The Boathouse Fire
- The Boathouse Fire Climax (Body Heat)
- The Censorship Battle
- The Glasses Switch
- The Window-Smashing Entrance
- Themes and Analysis (Body Heat)
- William Hurt
- two-paths-reasoning-body-heat
- two-paths-structure-body-heat