![body heat movie scene body heat movie scene](https://film-grab.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/bodyheat005.jpg)
They’re not done on purpose, they’re not as dramatic as undue influence or intestate cases or ignored heirs, broken promises, and a dozen other issues that will never serve as a movie plot, but they have the same effect: they hurt rightful heirs, they become disinherited.īody Heat wrapped a film-noir plot around an estate planning mistake. Some are caught right away, some not for years. Some have no effect, some are devastating.
![body heat movie scene body heat movie scene](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTM0ODk3MDgxM15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTYwNTI3MzU5._V1_.jpg)
There are so many, many things that can go wrong with a will or a trust. This is what we see a lot of – small mistakes that cast a completely out of proportion effect on the distribution of an estate. Inadvertent mistakes from inexperience that cost deserving heirs their inheritances. No, I’m thinking about the criminal defense attorney dipping into trust and estate law to pay his office overhead and. Not the ‘Matty Walker using Ned’s reputation to forge a trust that purposely violates that Rule Against Perpetuities so she can get her late, unlamented husband’s entire estate’ plot line – though that would be fascinating. I was reminded of the movie recently and it struck me how it fits some of our cases. It is so complex that the California Supreme Court made a ruling in the early Nineties that it is not malpractice if a California attorney misinterprets it. It is not written or interpreted that simply. Briefly (be thankful) it stops trusts from lasting forever. The rule dates from 1680 and is the stuff of nightmares for generations of law students. That’s right, Body Heat was a good movie, on a lot of top twenty lists for the Eighties, but is undoubtedly the single greatest movie ever made about the archaic Rule Against Perpetuities (George Clooney’s The Descendants is a distant second). He falls for Kathleen Turner’s Matty Walker, things get out of hand, people die, and the entire plot then revolves around.
![body heat movie scene body heat movie scene](https://s1.15min.lt/static/cache/MTkyMHgxMDgwLCw5OTksb3JpZ2luYWwsLGlkPTE1MTgwNDgmZGF0ZT0yMDE1JTJGMDclMkYxOSw0MTg0NDg2MTk4/video-kadras-body-heat-1981-love-scene-55ab1e800e9da.jpg)
Ned, you may have already remembered, is William Hurt’s character in the iconic 1980’s film-noir, Body Heat. To the point where he was brought before the Bar’s disciplinary committee and the case gained a local notoriety. He took a hefty one to draft wills and trusts for a new client. Empathetic, non-judgmental, he had excellent relationships with the District Attorney, Peter Lowenstein, and his investigator, Oscar Grace.Ī few years before we meet him, Ned’s practice was not doing well and he desperately needed a retainer. He was a very good criminal defense attorney. Ned Racine was a nice guy, very much laid back, handsome, funny, but possibly not the brightest man to ever graduate law school and pass the Florida Bar. It’s interesting, rewarding work, but it never occurred to us that it was interesting enough for a movie plot. We deal with probating poorly written wills and trusts fairly often we deal with disinherited heirs even more.