Big

Big | Tom Hanks, Elizabeth Parkins, Dir. Penny Marshall | 20th Century Fox | 1988

My rating: ♦♦♦♦◊

Tom Hanks stars in Big, one-half of a Freaky Friday experience. Josh is a 12-year-old schoolboy who laments his short stature deeming him too small to take part in a carnival ride. One ill conceived wish for a fortune teller arcade machine and he waked up 30.

While Big predated the better-known 1995 and 2003 editions of Freaky Friday, it comes after the original novel and first adaptation in the 1970’s. The concept isn’t outstandingly new, but at the time of its release in 1988 there had been relatively few successful predecessors in the genre. Therefore, while the entire plot can be worked out from almost the first couple of scenes, it would be remiss to forget that Big as much as any other film created the mould that so many followed.

Hanks is outstanding, capturing the essence of tweenagerdom in a highly believable performance. There is no doubt Josh really is a 12-year-old trapped in a body more than twice his age, and the versatility Hanks is known for is apparent here; he can jump around like Jedward on the blue Smarties as easily as he can sob into his pillow like the terrified chid he really is.

Big places Josh as a product tester for a toy manufacturer which gives some credibility to his continued existence in the adult world. He sticks out like a sore thumb, of course, but has the expected insight into what children really want from their toys. That he is embraced as an eccentric rather than a child under a magic spell is hardly a stretch. It is his entry into the business that leads to one of the best scenes of the movie as Josh and MacMillan (Loggia) himself dance on a large floor piano.

There are plenty of plot holes that drag the film down, though. After a prolonged period of being a big kid, Josh’s transition to psuedo-adult is rapid and for the most part unexplained, suggesting that the writers just wanted to get to the next bit of the storyboard. He uses his real name despite the police apparently (though invisibly) looking for him, and nobody ever seems to wonder where his best friend Billy (Rushton) keeps disappearing to.

Predictable now but groundbreaking at the time, Big has a warm feel to it and an inoffensive plot. It’s nostalgic and pulls of one of the few non-cheesy teenage bromances in Hollywood’s history. A little suspension of disbelief is required, but for an easy Sunday afternoon it’s worth a watch.