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Tag Archives: Kathleen Turner

Body Heat

27 Friday Nov 2015

Posted by vinnieh in Movie Reviews

≈ 50 Comments

Tags

1980's, Body Heat, J.A. Preston, Kathleen Turner, Lawrence Kasdan, Mickey Rourke, Neo Noir, Richard Crenna, Ted Danson, Thriller, William Hurt

Film Title

Body Heat

Director

Lawrence Kasdan

Starring

  • William Hurt as Ned Racine
  • Kathleen Turner as Matty Walker
  • Richard Crenna as Edmund Walker
  • Ted Danson as Peter Lowenstein
  •  J.A. Preston as Oscar Grace
  • Mickey Rourke as Teddy Lewis

A truly scintillating and wicked neo noir, Body Heat provides dark-hearted and sexy viewing as temperatures rise and danger lurks. As the directing debut of Lawrence Kasdan, he crafts a sultry tale of seduction and murder that burns with an erotic frisson and superb performances from the leads William Hurt and Kathleen Turner. With this being my first viewing of the film after hearing all the praise it had received, I’m happy to report that Body Heat more than lived up to my expectations.

The setting is Florida as a sweltering and unbearable heat wave grips the area. Body Heat PosterNed Racine is a sleazy lawyer who is bored and not exactly the sharpest guy out there. One fateful night while out, he encounters the seductive Matty Walker, a woman married to a very rich man. It is lust at first sight as Ned becomes entranced with the gorgeous Matty and soon begins a steamy affair with her while her husband is away. As the affair grows more intense, Matty begins to plant the seed of killing her husband. It appears that having signed a prenup, Matty wouldn’t inherit anything of her husbands fortune from a divorce. Only if her husband dies first does everything of value go to her. Matty and NedIncreasingly bewitched by Matty, Ned agrees to it hoping that his workings with the law will enable the two to escape from justice. Successfully going through with it, Ned kills and seems to cover up any sign of murder, staging it as an arson job that went wrong. Yet as events take a darker turn, the bewildered Ned begins to realise that the alluring Matty has other ideas of her own and for the whole time has used him for her own gain in a devious plan. Yet by this point, it could be too late for Ned as he becomes prime suspect in the case that Matty so cunningly orchestrated and ensnared him in.

Lawrence Kasdan, as writer and debuting director, is on fine form in both seats. Respectfully giving notice to the dark noir of the past and updating it with a sexy pulse, he makes sure Body Heat is deliciously dark and wicked as hell. As writer, he contributes a smart, crackling script laced with double entendres and a keen sense of events unraveling slowly but very surely in a suitably dark and dangerous style. Ned Racine Body HeatWith this movies, the talented Kasdan works utter wonders in the way he brings out the dangerous machinations that femme fatale Matty has crafted in a slow burning way and cloaks them in a sweltering and sexual ambience. There are some excellent moments of dark foreshadowing that are peppered through Body Heat as warnings for Ned that he misses as the plot becomes more sinister.The heatwave that grips steamy Florida almost becomes a character itself and as an audience, we can feel the sweat and steamy passion sizzling from every frame. I think it’s safe to say that after viewing Body Heat, you may need to cool down from the sizzling heat of it all. Body Heat Bath SceneAnd speaking of sizzling, no discussion of Body Heat would be complete without talking about the erotic encounters between Ned and Matty. Strikingly shot in bold oranges and shadows, they form the darkly passionate core of the movie and the chemistry between Hurt and Turner practically sets the screen on fire. A score accentuated with smooth jazz from John Barry goes a long way in helping set the sultry tone of this masterful thriller.

William Hurt is well cast as Ned, capturing the womanizing nature, easily led and naive mannerisms of him as he quickly becomes trapped in Matty’s plan and can’t see no way out as he is clearly in over his head because of his blinding passion for her. Yet the biggest impression made in Body Heat is from Kathleen Turner, in what was her debut role. Matty WalkerSeductive, husky voiced and coldly calculating beneath the surface, Turner is marvellous at imbuing Matty with a dark sense of deception, masked by come hither glances and sexual energy. It is the definition of a star making role and Turner knows it as she creates a modern femme fatale who is bad to the bone and as manipulative as they come, constantly two steps ahead of all the other characters. Engaging supporting performances from Richard Crenna as the ill-fated husband, Ted Danson as Ned’s nerdy prosecutor friend and Oscar Grace as a detective thinking that Ned knows more than he’s telling all contribute their presence to the film. And watch out for an early performance from Mickey Rourke as one of Ned’s former clients who supplies him with the means to go through with murder.

Body Heat is an excellent example of how to successfully create a neo noir with just the right amount of hat-tipping to the past and the perfect contemporary setting for modern audiences.

The Virgin Suicides

01 Wednesday May 2013

Posted by vinnieh in Movie Reviews

≈ 45 Comments

Tags

1990's, Drama, James Woods, Josh Hartnett, Kathleen Turner, Kirsten Dunst, Sofia Coppola, The Virgin Suicides

Film Title

The Virgin Suicides

Director

Sofia Coppola

Cast

  • James Woods as Ronald Lisbon
  • Kathleen Turner as Sara Lisbon
  • Kirsten Dunst as Lux Lisbon
  • Josh Hartnett as Trip Fontaine
  • A.J. Cook as Mary Lisbon
  • Hanna R. Hall as Cecilia Lisbon
  • Leslie Hayman as Therese Lisbon
  • Chelse Swain as Bonnie Lisbon
  • Jonathan Tucker as Tim Winer
  • Noah Shebib as Parkie Denton
  • Anthony DeSimone as Chase Buell
  • Lee Kagan as David Barker
  • Giovanni Ribisi as Narrator

The Virgin SuicidThe Lisbon Sisterses marks the directorial debut of Sofia Coppola. Based on the acclaimed novel, it is a poignant, lyrical and mysterious tale of teenage awkwardness and the effects that mystery has on the mind for years. Featuring a haunting score by Air and evocative cinematography, it perfectly captures the conflicted feelings of blossoming sexual attraction and the alienation of teenage years.

Set in a 1970’s  Michigan suburb, the plot focuses on a group of boys who are entranced by the five beautiful Lisbon sisters; Cecilia, Lux, Bonnie, Therese and Mary . Although they don’t physically know any of them, the boys dream up fantasies about them because of the mystery surrounding them. Presided over by strict, suffocating parents, the girls are the intangible desire of the boys who can’t seem to fathom them. The film is narrated in flashback by one of the boys who is still plagued by memories of the sisters and still looking for answers as to why each of them took their own lives. After the youngest daughter, Cecilia finally succeeds in killing herself by impaling herself on the railings outside, the mother and father of the girls The-virgin-suicides boysbegin to shelter their daughters from the outside world, further enhancing the enigmatic air that hangs over them. Complications arise when the school heart-throb Trip Fontaine falls for the sexually precocious Lux and the girls are allowed to attend the usually forbidden homecoming dance. The actions of their over-protective parents leads the girls into isolation and desperation, yet they still are in the thoughts of the boys who the spell has been cast on.  What emerges is a bittersweet examination of girls growing up into women and the mystique surrounding the seemingly untouchable.

Sofia Coppola perfectly conjures up the mystical tale, showing how much the tragic, flaxen-haired beauties had an effect on the boys. As the narrator tells us, they are still looking for an answer after almost 20 years. Through the use of dream sequences, stunningly shot and evocatively scored, the sisters become ethereal beings presiding over the burgeoning attraction of these boys. Coppola’s script pierces to the heart of teenage angst with a reflective eye and also manages to examine the difficult theme of suicide in an effective way, rather than sugar-coating it. Music plays an integral part in the film, especially adding to the the-virgin-suicides Record sceneemotional impact is a stunning score by Air. The scene in which the isolated sisters communicate with the boys by playing records over the phone is moving in its look at the power of unspoken words and how music is an almost universal language. Out of the sisters, Lux is the most interesting, mainly because of Kirsten Dunst’s portrayal of a young sexually precocious girl who rebels against her overbearing parents, She excellently conveys the pained expression of a pressured girl approaching womanhood, yet trapped in a cage intent on preserving her innocence. Turner and Woods turn in great performances as the parents who take strict to a Trip Fontainewhole new level. Josh Hartnett also stars as the popular guy who in adulthood regrets his treatment of the beautiful Lux.

Interestingly, we are never told the reason as to why the girls took their own lives, Coppola lets the audience decide this outcome. A reflective melancholy hangs over the film, heightened by the narrator’s voice that combines a wide-eyed youthful quality but a pensive and mature sadness. Because of these ambiguities, The Virgin Suicides makes for a starting but dreamlike watch as we watch the sister’s influence on the boys and how to the day they still haunt them like muses from myth.

Evocative, intense and profound, The Virgin Suicides is a true testament to Coppola’s sensitive direction that lets the audience follow the lives of these mysterious girls and the boys forever plagued by their memory with a childlike wonder but a certain amount of time for rumination.

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