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Seven friends: Harold (Kevin Kline), his wife Sarah (Glenn Close), Sam (Tom Berenger), Michael (Jeff Goldblum), Nick (William Hurt), Karen (JoBeth Williams) and Meg (Mary Kay Place) reunite unfortunately to mourn the loss of one of their beloved, Alex (Kevin Costner, unseen) along with his girlfriend Chloe (Meg Tilly). After the funeral they all spend the weekend together to try and figure out what is it that drove Alex to its unprecedented suicide, as well as questioning their own values compared to today’s society.

In an ever-changing world, The Big Chill is a document of its time, just like Saturday Night Fever was to the 70’s, since it captured in that very moment how the “baby boom” generation and their ideals had grown (until then) over the past 20 years. To understand the angst of the characters in the film you must understand the reasons of that time in which they lived when they were young. The 60’s was a turbulent decade; you had the Vietnam War raging, JFK’s and Martin Luther King’s assassinations, The Cuban invasion black and women’s rights movements and the imminent presence of the Cold War. All of this was widely covered and depicted by the news media all around the country and the world. In other words, the government was constantly smeared due to all this information. So obviously the American youth reacted against their government since they didn’t agree on American soldiers fighting a war that wasn’t even theirs. And due to that social impact, the youth rebellion surged up, therefore launching several movements like the hippies and socialists amongst them. Drug use and sex was fluent since everyone wanted to flee that painful view. Everything was just chaos.

But then what happens? Time passes by to the point that society has changed but you realize not all changed with it. The 80’s arrive and now the media is more restricted when it comes to information; several social problems have been resolved. The Cold War is still there (or was) but it doesn’t seem as threatening as it was before. Everything is more relaxed, more synthetic, and mysteriously calm even though several political problems arise though are carefully masqueraded through the media. All of this generated an aura of cynicism which predominates everywhere, even to this day. People don’t believe in anything, not even their shadows. So all those people that believed in their own causes, feel lonelier than ever, like if it were a dream, and ask themselves, where did all my ideals went to? The only thing left are your friends and the love of your friends, and the memories of that time. Many have changed, but others still dream in that time and prefer not to wake in the real world.

This state of mind is brilliantly captured by Kasdan and his co-writer Barbara Benedeck. The disillusion, the confusion, and of course, looking ahead into the future. I guess it’s these types of mentalities present in the film which have made the film dated according to some, but people fail to realize that times change and that obviously ideals explored in such films like Wild in The Streets and Easy Rider are just not the same ideals we explore today. We all change, and in the end, that’s Kasdan’s point: We all change but the future didn’t change with us.

Cinematically, the film has great production values, with Kasdan providing us a kick-ass soundtrack of oldies, all carefully selected to fit and give an ironic meaning in various memorable scenes of the film (notably, the funeral procession accompanied with the Rolling Stones classic “You can’t always get what you want” which is a symbolic metaphor of them burying their once important ideals). It also features one of the many perfect examples of ensemble casting, with each actor contributing to a whole perfectly. If we had to pick the notables, I’d say Glenn Close but more notably William Hurt since his performance in this film along with his previous one in Body Heat (which Kasdan also wrote and directed) precluded his taking of the reins as the leading actor of the 80’s.

In the end, if you’re one of the younger generations who don’t care about or don’t care to know about the past or your parent’s or grandparent’s past, this film is not for you because you’ll never get it. If you’re an intelligent guy or gal that cares about your past and your parents or grandparents or is capable of seeing the forest through the trees and understands the ideals of those times, then this film is for you. It's quite a unique experience that it’s almost a requirement to be from that generation to fully understand it but nevertheless, it’s a testament from that time from people who simply wished the world changed for the better but in their own view didn’t. 5-5

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originally posted: 10/03/04 08:41:55
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