A seminal Thirty-Something movie in which a group of old college friends who are now all grown up and hardened by the big wide world come together for the funeral of Alex, a barely glimpsed corpse, who was at one time the brightest and the best of them, and yet who never managed to achieve half as much as any of the others. The friends use the occasion to reacquaint themselves with each other and to speculate as to what happened to their idealism which had been abundant when they were younger.Written by
Mark Thompson <mrt@oasis.icl.co.uk>
"The Ladd Company, producers of [writer-director Lawrence Kasdan's earlier] Body Heat (1981), passed on the project as did top executives at Paramount, Universal, MGM, 20th Century Fox and Warner Bros [and Columbia Pictures]. It was Marcia Nasatir, then president of Carson Films, who finally persuaded Columbia chairman Frank Price and president Guy McElwaine to back the project" according to Torene Svitil's essay with the Criterion Collection's DVD. On the 15th Anniversary DVD documentary, Lawrence Kasdan says how every major studio had turned down the project, including Columbia who ended it making it, they just couldn't see it. It was the belief of Nasatir that catalyzed the film to get made at Columbia, though, according to Kasdan, with much resistance, and toing and froing, until they reluctantly agreed to make it. See more »
Goofs
The fog completely disappears after Harold's brief close-up shot when he and Nick are jogging through town. See more »
Quotes
Sam Weber:
[Sam enters a room where Nick is up late watching TV]
What's this?
Nick:
I'm not sure.
Sam Weber:
What's it about?
Nick:
I don't know.
Sam Weber:
[Sam shakes his head, pats Nick on the shoulder, then sits in a nearby chair]
Who's that?
Nick:
I think the guy in the hat did something terrible.
[shot of TV shows a man being thrown through the glass window of a door; all the people on the TV screen are wearing hats]
Sam Weber:
Like what?
Nick:
You're so analytical! Sometimes you just have to let art... flow... over you.
[Sam rolls his eyes]
See more »
Alternate Versions
In the original, during the scene where Meg is talking about how all guys are either married or gay, she says the line "...or, they've just broken up with a bitch who looks just like me...". In the network version, she says "...or, they've broken up with someone who looks just like me...". In the original, in one of the last scenes, Micheal says "I think everyone does everything just to get laid". In the network version, however, he says "I think every one does every thing just to get something good". See more »
It took a little while for me to really get into the film, but in the end, I was hooked. Once I got to know a little about each of the characters, I found it hard not to care about each and every one of them. Yes, it was dialogue-heavy, but once I liked the people on-screen, the conversations became rather engrossing. Even if lots of talking doesn't sound too appealing, I still think you should give it a look, because it isn't too often that a film has a cast that is so hugely talented. And of course, this film has one of the greatest soundtracks in movie history, and these songs seem to fit the mood perfectly. I had high expectations for this film, and although it wasn't quite what I had expected, this film did not disappoint.
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It took a little while for me to really get into the film, but in the end, I was hooked. Once I got to know a little about each of the characters, I found it hard not to care about each and every one of them. Yes, it was dialogue-heavy, but once I liked the people on-screen, the conversations became rather engrossing. Even if lots of talking doesn't sound too appealing, I still think you should give it a look, because it isn't too often that a film has a cast that is so hugely talented. And of course, this film has one of the greatest soundtracks in movie history, and these songs seem to fit the mood perfectly. I had high expectations for this film, and although it wasn't quite what I had expected, this film did not disappoint.