There’s a scene in Atonement where Patrick Wilson’s character, Leon Tallis, declares “I love England in a heat wave. It’s a different country. All the rules change.” While Atonement may not be entered into the canon of “sweat cinema,” this line underscores the sentiment, the same reason that my friends in colder states claim that “everyone goes feral” when the temperature starts rising and that summer is my favorite season. I love the heat, and not just because I love to swim or because I’m really passionate about barbecues. Heat does change the rules; society regresses, at least a little bit, but in a way that can be really fun.

As far as directorial debuts go, Body Heat stands in a league of its own. Lawrence Kasdan, like many of his peers, began his career as a screenwriter. Some of his titles might ring a bell: Raiders of the Lost Ark, for example, or The Empire Strikes Back. But after years of delivering his work to the likes of Spielberg and Lucas and watching his stories change form in their hands, Kasdan (with Lucas’s support) was ready to direct his own film. Rather than continue with the action-adventure stories he was becoming known for, he pivoted to a neo-noir featuring actors that had yet to become the stars they are now: Kathleen Turner in her first feature, William Hurt and Mickey Rourke, and a pre-Cheers Ted Danson. There was another goal, too: “I wanted to make the sexiest possible movie. Because I felt, even then, a time coming out of the '70s, things were relatively explicit, but they weren't sexy to me. I wanted to make a movie that was sexy." Lawrence, thank you for your service, because you absolutely gave us the horniest, sweatiest movie ever shot in Florida.

People can’t talk about Body Heat without talking about the sweat: beading, dripping, soaking through cotton shirts and silk nightgowns. Matty (Turner) and Ned (Hurt) meet on a boardwalk in a Florida heat wave and decide to change the rules. “I told you, I’ve got a husband,” she says, pulling her hair up to catch a breeze on the nape of her neck. The change is in those small actions: the contradiction between the husband and the newly exposed skin, between Ned’s suit jacket and his rolled-up sleeves. As Nelly once said, “it’s getting hot in here (so hot), so take off all your clothes,” and oh, do they. In the heat of the summer nights, Matty and Ned scheme and conspire and, yes, fuck.

While Matty and Ned straddle each other, they also straddle the line between pleasure and danger. After all, she does have that absentee husband, and she can sense how strong Ned’s desire is. Like any good, conniving femme fatale, Matty leverages that lust, putting the erotic in erotic neo-noir. “You aren’t too smart, are you? I like that in a man.” Honestly, though, who could blame Ned for getting hypnotized by Kathleen Turner? It’s biology!

The body flushes and sweats when we’re elevated, whether in temperature or in emotion, and under the right circumstances, what is sometimes kind of gross is instead intoxicating. The department of horny science attributes it to pheromones, of course, just like in every other animal species; you and me, baby, we ain’t nothing but mammals. Countless studies have explored the connection between sweat and sexuality, such as one where researchers studied the brain activity of women who were given sweat samples taken from men. Each man provided two: one from when they were simply sweaty, and another from when they were aroused. The scent of horny sweat consistently activated the parts of the brain that own emotion and sexuality. Like Matty says: “Some men, once they get a whiff of it, they trail you like a hound.”

It makes sense, then, that summertime pushes the rules off-kilter. We cast off our chunky knits in favor of swimsuits and cutoffs; we stay out late, seeking respite from the sun on a darkened patio; we post memes about getting railed in a sundress. We’re all just so very, very hot, and the heat and the sweat make us revert back to that feral state that we joke about. Ned’s a fool, but who among us wouldn’t fall victim to Matty, letting her play us like a sexy, sexy fiddle? As we fight for our lives in our own blistering summer, let BODY HEAT be a reminder that our instincts don’t always work in our favor. Try to keep your head on straight, even if it’s the only thing you keep on; remember the duality of pleasure and danger. More than anything, though, don’t forget to hydrate; you’re going to need it.

Perspire & Desire: The Sexy, Sweaty Appeal of Body Heat