The Big Chill (15th Anniversary Collector's Edition) [DVD]

Lawrence Kasdan's 1983 big-budget variation on John Sayles' s The Return of the Secaucus Seven finds a cluster of old college radicals--who have since gone on to sundry professions and various degrees of materialism--reuniting over the death of a friend.

Both playful and thoughtful, the film represents Kasdan (Body Heat) at his most astute.

The attractive cast meshes perfectly into a group of characters for which a former closeness is out of synch with their current lives, yet their warmth is enviable and inviting.

The script may be a bit too glib, with many one-liners, but it is still a perfectly designed story with telling irony and no little passion.--Tom Keogh