Big Daddy
*
Rated on a 4-star
scale
USA
Directed by Dennis Dugan
Written by Steve Franks, Tim Herlihy and Adam Sandler
From a story by Steve Franks
CAST.....
Adam Sandler..... Sonny Koufax
Cole Sprouse and Dylan Sprouse..... Julian
Joey Lauren Adams..... Layla
Jon Stewart..... Kevin Gerrity
Rob Schneider..... Delivery Guy
Leslie Mann..... Corinne
Kristy Swanson..... Vanessa
Steve Buscemi..... Homeless Guy
On the way to the screening of "Big
Daddy", I stopped at the men's room to relieve my bladder. Sonny
Koufax, the film's main character, would probably have had no qualms doing
this in the auditorium -- after all, he urinates on such public places as
restaurant patios, and encourages a young boy to imitate such anti-social
behaviour. Adam Sandler, who plays the role, is the current Adolf Hitler
of screen comedians -- millions love to watch his crazy act, unaware of how
creepy and nasty it really is.
Sonny is a law-school graduate who doesn't bother
to take the bar exam and practice litigation, preferring to live off the
personal injury settlement he won when a taxi ran over his foot. The obnoxious
loser lies around all day eating junk food, playing cards with a delicatessen
delivery guy, making jokes about strippers and interfering with the lives
of old friends.
After his roommate Kevin (Jon Stewart) goes on
a long business trip to China, a five-year-old kid shows up at the door,
with a note attached to inform the absent chap that he's a father. Through
plot contrivances, Sonny is forced to take care of the lad (Cole/Dylan Sprouse),
whose given name is Julian, but he re-titles Frankenstein.
Sonny goes even further to "take care" of this
boy with all the guardianship of someone carrying out the task in its criminal
context. Aside from the unwise policies on suitable monikers and places to
pee-pee, he allows young Frankenstein to go without bathing and throw cans
around in the supermarket. He teaches him to jump into the paths of moving
cars, shout obscenities, throw tantrums in public, hurl abuse at the elderly,
threaten strangers, hate people who have certain musical and fashion tastes,
destroy peoples' food in McDonald's and try to maim roller-skaters. One horrific
moment shows the sociopath and his pupil go trick-or-treating. A knock at
a house door goes unanswered, so they break in, assault the resident and
rob him. Ho, ho, ho.
This all leads to a development in which Social
Services discover what's going on, and Sonny has to fight for custody of
the child. There is a sentimental turnaround tacked on, as Sonny becomes
more responsible, but could anything be more phony? If the film truly disapproved
of the early antics, why did it portray them as funny? This is supposed to
be broad visual comedy, not a study of human rage like "Mississippi Burning",
which made us feel guilty about our instinctual positive responses to the
heroes' violent actions.
The conversion isn't even very convincing. Sonny
talks a lot about learning parental responsibility and falling in love with
a capable woman called Layla (Joey Lauren Adams), but his actual demeanour
remains self-obsessed and he's turned the kid into an irreversibly animalistic
illiterate who can barely string a sentence together. Sandler uses more
recognisable human mannerisms than he did in "The Waterboy", but also whines
and drones offensive babble, displaying none of the charm and energy present
in his best film, last year's "The Wedding Singer".
Steve Buscemi is amusing as a deranged bum, and
director Dennis Dugan controls camerawork and pacing with professionalism.
But it's impossible to produce anything worthwhile from this screenplay,
which has ugly, twisted morals. The climax of "Big Daddy" takes place in
a courtroom, and in comedy, this turn usually means all ideas are depleted.
Thank goodness. I don't think I could have taken many more of this movie's
ideas.
COPYRIGHT© 1999 Ian
Waldron-Mantgani
1999 Reviews
(alphabetical)
1999 Reviews (by star
rating)
Archive of all cinema reviews
(alphabetical)
Review Archive
Index
UK
Critic main page
|
![[Image]](http://www.ukcritic.com/posbanr2.gif)