Screen legend Burt Reynolds died yesterday at the age of 82, and while he became a major movie star in the '70s thanks to films like The Longest Yard and Smokey and the Bandit, he never was fully recognized as an actor until 1997's Boogie Nights.
He received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for the movie, which is set in the pornography world of the late '70s and early '80s. Reynolds plays Jack Horner, a porn director with dreams of auteurism. He recruits Dirk Diggler (Mark Wahlberg), who becomes the biggest star in porn -- in more than one sense of the word -- before it all comes crashing down onto a giant mound of cocaine.
The movie is packed start-to-finish with rock, funk, pop and disco hits from that era, including the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows," Hot Chocolate's "You Sexy Thing," Three Dog Night's "Mama Told Me Not to Come" and the Heatwave song that gave the film its name. There was one song that writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson really wanted to use for the end credits: "Livin' Thing" by Electric Light Orchestra, but the band's frontman, Jeff Lynne, stood in the way.