(This is an act of copy and paste of my post at another forum :))
I watched this movie by Lawrence Kasdan last year for the first time and immediately liked it. Seven mixed-gender, baby-boomers friends (now in their late 30s in the movie) get together on the funeral of the eighth one (who commits suicide) in early 80s’ day. One of the most remarkable achievements of this movie when it was released (1983) was that everyone, regardless of age and gender, related to its story.
The storyline and picturalization is marked by two prominent aspects which make this movie a great hit. The first aspect is the transformation of a generation from baby boomer era to 80s yuppie lifestyle. The characters and dialogues portray a mix of revolutionary intellectualism borrowed from 60s life experiences and a middle-class materialistic contention to survive in 80s. The portrayal of this somewhat natural (or more accurately, socially logical) transition of a generation is one of the most striking elements of this movie. It is interesting to see how the characters possess countercultural values over the span of their generation continuum after living through 60s and 80s. I am not a baby boomer myself but when I watched the movie, it hit me with intense nostalgia. And nostalgic is exactly how this movie leaves you.
The second aspect of the movie, in my opinion, has nothing to do with any generation-wide dynamics. This aspect deals with reunion of friends, their reminiscence of good old days and realization of how dissimilar and similar from each other have they grown in their own separate lives. The representation of cozy, warm, and comfortable presence of friends who grew up together was something that made everybody to relate to and like this movie. With all their love and affection, they still stand apart on certain ‘split values’ which adds to the realization of what they are today as compared to what they were yesterday. I think it is a great achievement on director’s part to make the audience feel the closeness of friendship that the characters hold without adding any past flashbacks in the movie.
The cast is marvelous with all the famous and talented people like Glenn Close, Kelvin Kline, William Hurt, Meg Tilly, Tom Bernger, Mary Kay Place, Jeff Goldblum, and Jobeth Williams. And its soundtrack is one of the greatest in the movie history with scores from Marvin Gaye, Temptations, Stones (oh, yeah), Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Beach Boys, and The Rascals (Actually there are two different CDs for the soundtrack. One is titled ‘The Big Chill’ and other one is 'The Big Chill: More Songs From…").
Among my top three most favorite movies of all time (the other two are The Godfather and Pulp Fiction), The Big Chill stands at the top.