June 25, 1999 | Adam Sandler tries to
have the best of both worlds - and, to a large degree, succeeds - in
Big Daddy, a comedy that
balances the happy-puppy sentiment of The Wedding Singer with
the broad-as-a-barn silliness of The Waterboy. And while it may
strike you as a bit early in Sandler's career for a greatest-hits compilation,
the new movie is considerably more than the sum of it second-hand parts.
Big
Daddy finds Sandler perfectly cast as Sonny Koufax, a 32-year-old
law school graduate who has never gotten around to taking his bar exam.
Indeed, he hasn't gotten around to very much at all during a life of
self-indulgent slackerdom. Sonny doesn't need to work, thanks to his
crafty investment of an insurance settlement. But Vanessa (Kristy Swanson),
his long-time girlfriend, thinks there is more to life than sleeping
late, lunching on breakfast cereal and watching TV until it's time to
order take-out.
While
Kevin (Jon Stewart), Sonny's more goal-oriented roommate, is out of
the country on business, a 5-year-old boy is dropped off at their apartment.
Julian (played variously by twins Cole and Dylan Sprouse) apparently
is the product of Kevin's long-ago one-night stand with a woman who
no longer can care for the child. Sonny obligingly takes charge of the
situation - and decides to adopt Julian. That way, he figures, he will
demonstrate to Vanessa that he really is a mature and responsible grown-up.
Unfortunately,
when Sonny brings Julian over to Vanessa's apartment, she's already
entertaining a new boyfriend. And when Sonny tries to return Julian
to the child-welfare authorities, he's told that the boy will be stuck
in an orphanage until a suitable foster family can be found. So Sonny
agrees to keep Julian for a little while. But not for long. Just temporarily.
Not permanently. Yeah, right.
The
makers of Big Daddy are quite shameless in their yanking of heartstrings
as Sonny becomes a better person through his misadventures in child
rearing. Fortunately, the movie is too funny, and Sandler is too ingratiating,
for you to mind the manipulation. Big Daddy generates so much
good will during its first hour or so that you stick with it even during
the inevitable shift into tearjerking as the bad old social workers
try to reclaim Julian, and Sonny must clean up his act to defend himself
in a courtroom encounter.
There
is something gleefully subversive about the family values upheld in
much of the movie's first half, as Sonny teaches Julian how to pee against
walls, trip unwary Rollerbladers, make a meal from ketchup packets -
in short, how to be just like Sonny. And when Sonny is encouraged to
become a better father after being strongly discouraged from parenting
by his own disapproving dad (Joe Bologna), it becomes all the more obvious
that, bless his heart, Sonny is just a big kid himself. All he really
needs to grow up is the chance to be someone else's daddy.
Under
the gracefully unobtrusive direction of Dennis Dugan (who also led Sandler
through his paces in Happy Gilmore), Big Daddy is a star
vehicle that has more than enough room to accommodate some fine work
by a first-rate supporting cast. Joey Lauren Adams is disarmingly charming
as Layla, the smiley sweetheart who brings out the best in Sonny, while
Rob Schneider (as an English-mangling take-out-food delivery guy) and
Steve Buscemi (as a homeless man with a fondness for breakfast sandwiches
from McDonald's) are reliably wacky scene-stealers. There are cheap
laughs here and there, and a couple of grotty gross-out gags. More often,
however, Big Daddy is uncommonly sweet-natured and warm-hearted
in its approach to making audiences giggle.