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"Big Daddy" is a film about a seriously disturbed slacker who adopts a 5-year-old and tutors him in cynicism, cruel practical jokes and antisocial behavior. It's not every film where an adult role model throws himself in front of a moving car just to cheer the kid up. "Man, this Yoo-Hoo is good!" the adult tells the tyke. "You know what else is good? Smoking dope!" On the way down in the elevator after the "Big Daddy" screening, a fellow critic speculated that the line about weed was intended not as a suggestion, but as a feeler: The hero was subtly trying to find out if the kid and his friends were into drugs. I submit that so few 5-year-old are into drugs that it's not a problem, and that some older kids in the audience will not interpret the line as a subtle feeler.

"Big Daddy" stars Adam Sandler as Sonny Koufax, a layabout who wins $200,000 in a lawsuit after a cab runs over his foot, and now hangs around the Manhattan loft that he shares with his roommate, a lawyer played by Jon Stewart--who must be doing well, since the space they occupy would sell or rent for serious money. Sonny's girlfriend Vanessa ( Kristy Swanson ) tells him to get a real job, but he says he has one: He's a tollbooth attendant, I guess, although the movie gives him nothing but days off.

Just after the roommate heads out of town, little Julian (played by twins Cole and Dylan Sprouse) is dropped at the door. He is allegedly the roommate's love child. Sonny tries to turn the kid over to social services, but they're closed for Columbus Day, and so he ends up taking Julian to Central Park for his favorite pastime, which is throwing tree branches in the paths of speeding inline skaters. One middle-aged blader hits a branch, takes a nasty fall and ends up in the lagoon. What fun.

The predictable story arc has Sonny and Julian bonding. This is not as easy as it sounds, since any Adam Sandler character is self-obsessed to such a degree that his conversations sound like interior monologues. It is supposed to be funny that Sonny has a pathological hostility against society; when McDonald's won't serve them breakfast, he throws another customer's fries on the floor, and when a restaurant won't let the kid use the restroom, he and the kid pee on the restaurant's side door.

The movie is filled to the limit with all the raunchy words allowed by the PG-13 rating, and you may be surprised how many and varied they are. There's a crisis when a social worker ( Josh Mostel ) turns up, and Sonny impersonates his roommate and claims to be the kid's dad. We're supposed to think it would be nice if Sonny could win custody of little Julian. I think it would be a tragedy. If the kid turns out like Sonny, he's probably looking at prison time or heavy-duty community service. Sonny is the first couch potato I've seen with road rage.

The film is chock-full of supporting characters. The most entertaining is Layla ( Joey Lauren Adams ), whose sister is engaged to Sonny's roommate. (The sister is a former Hooters girl, leading to more talk about hooters than a non-drug-using 5-year-old is likely to require.) Adams, who was so good in " Chasing Amy ," is good here, too, bringing a certain sanity to the plot, although I don't know what a smart girl like Layla would see in this closed-off, angry creep. Even when Sonny tries to be nice, you can see the passive aggression peeking around his smile.

The final courtroom scene is one of those movie fantasies where the judge bangs her gavel while everyone in the movie grandstands--yes, even the homeless person ( Steve Buscemi ) who has tagged along for the ride, an old drunk from Sonny's local bar, and the gay lawyers who Sonny knows from law school. (Like many gay characters in comedies, they kiss and hug at every opportunity; why don't they just wear signboards?) There have been many, many movies using the story that "Big Daddy" recycles. Chaplin's "The Kid" used Jackie Coogan as the urchin; " Little Miss Marker " (versions by Shirley Temple and Walter Matthau ) was about an innocent tyke and a bookie; Jim Belushi's " Curly Sue " has some of the same elements. What they had in common were adults who might have made good parents. "Big Daddy" should be reported to the child welfare office.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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Film credits.

Big Daddy (1999)

Rated PG-13 For Language and Some Crude Humor

Adam Sandler as Sonny Koufax

Rob Schneider as Delivery Guy

Jon Stewart as Kevin Gerrity

Joey Lauren Adams as Layla

Kristy Swanson as Vanessa

Based On A Story by

• Steve Franks
• Adam Sandler
• Tim Herlihy

Directed by

• Dennis Dugan

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Big Daddy Reviews

Though it is not as side-splittingly funny as Waterboy or Happy Gilmore, it still carries universal themes that resonate today.

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Jan 12, 2023

Some so-so Adam Sandler for the evening.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Apr 17, 2020

Amiable, schizoid and disposable, Big Daddy is just as formulaic as you might imagine.

Full Review | Mar 2, 2018

Typical Adam Sandler -- charm mixed with crude humor.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Dec 22, 2010

The heavy-handed sentimentality provokes a most violent gag reflex.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Nov 29, 2009

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 7, 2008

Ending is predictably gooey but Sandler's edge staves off the sludge for long enough in an otherwise fresh and funny piece.

Full Review | Jun 2, 2008

This light yet earnest drama starring Adam Sandler deals openly with one of the most insidious elements in popular filmmaking -- the male screenwriter's relationship with his own father.

Those expecting another run of the mill Sandler film will either be pleasantly surprised or disgusted by this foray of his into new and different territory.

Full Review | Jan 15, 2008

Full Review | Original Score: 1.5/4 | Dec 27, 2007

Another genial Sandler opus.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Jul 23, 2007

However simplistic Big Daddy is, it is also easy viewing.

Full Review | Dec 11, 2006

This lightweight, bubblegum caper synthesises robust, physical humour, self-deprecation and witty one liners. The main problem, as with most other dumb boy pictures, is that the supporting characters are underwritten.

Full Review | Feb 9, 2006

Things roll along quite charmingly, until the action hit the courtroom and gets bogged down in a boorish, maudlin custody case.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Dec 6, 2005

Funny-sweet, understand, not bleccchh sweet.

Full Review | Jul 21, 2005

An essentially mean-spirited comedy.

Full Review | Original Score: C | Apr 9, 2005

Sandler continues to bring a sweetness, irreverence and unpredictability to the screen that make hits out of his films.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | May 20, 2003

Though there are several truly funny moments in Big Daddy, they're all included in the trailer, so if you've seen it, that's all you need.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 8, 2003

Not so bad.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Oct 15, 2002

...you just might wind up with a new found respect for Sandler.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 26, 2002

"Big Daddy" marks a step forward for Adam Sandler, as well as a strategy to expand his audience. While the loyal male-teen aud core will not be disappointed with the spate of gags just for them, story contains solid date-movie material and pic may well post domestic numbers matching those of megahit "The Waterboy."

By Robert Koehler

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“Big Daddy” marks a step forward for Adam Sandler, as well as a strategy to expand his audience. While the loyal male-teen aud core will not be disappointed with the spate of gags just for them, story contains solid date-movie material and pic may well post domestic numbers matching those of megahit “The Waterboy.”

Sandler and the female audience discovered each other with “The Wedding Singer,” and he and regular writing partner Tim Herlihy retooled Steve Frank’s script to ensure that those women will keep rooting for him.

It’s typical Sandler territory in the early going as we meet 32-year-old slacker Sonny Koufax (the name an overt baseball homage), who works one day a week as a tollbooth attendant and spends loads of free time and money in the Big Apple, having collected a $200,000 award from a car accident. His grownup friends (mostly lawyers) are growing tired of his goofball ways, while g.f. Vanessa (Kristy Swanson) says she wants to go upstate and take some time off to think about their relationship.

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After popping the question to Hooters girl turned doctor Corinne (Leslie Mann), Sonny’s roomie and fellow law school alum Kevin (Jon Stewart) is about to wing off to a job in China when pint-size, 5-year-old Julian (a role shared by identical twins Cole and Dylan Sprouse) shows up at Sonny’s door. Julian shyly claims that he’s Kevin’s child from Buffalo, N.Y., but Kevin has never been to Buffalo, and leaves Sonny to take care of the kid during the Columbus Day holiday.

Before this least-likely dad can sort out things with social services bureaucrat Mr. Brooks (Josh Mostel), he bonds with Julian in a series of scenes balanced between juvenile comedy and heartwarming affection.

Sonny, realizing that his unexpected fatherhood is the ideal lure for Vanessa, poses as Kevin with Mr. Brooks, and gains custody. Even as Sonny and Julian grow closer — tyke dresses up any way he wants in public and wishes to be addressed as Frankenstein, and the two have their way with New Yorkers in parks and while trick-or-treating — Vanessa dumps Sonny for an absurdly older fellow, and Mr. Brooks gets wind of Sonny’s ruse.

In a narrative stretch that proves unexpectedly rewarding, Sonny runs into Layla (Joey Lauren Adams), Corinne’s nicer sis, leading to pic’s most charming scene: Sonny and Layla turn a bedtime story for Julian into a will-you-see-me-again dialogue. Besides giving him her heart, Layla (yet another lawyer, for the Sierra Club), also provides her pro bono services when Brooks takes Julian away and Sonny fights for custody.

Final section plays out in the courtroom, where Sonny finally faces off with his heartless dad (Joe Bologna) and Stewart’s by-now-forgotten character has an 11th-hour revelation.

“Happy Gilmore” helmer Dennis Dugan returns with far more confidence this time, though with fewer outrageous visual stunts. Tone is sometimes too carefully calibrated to appeal to all sectors, so the gross-out stuff is balanced with scenes of Sandler’s character in moments of repose and thoughtfulness, with Adams’ Layla a significant maturing force.

Result is uneven; the story’s more serious intentions often jar with the goofy sideshow. The inevitable happy ending is only slightly less pat and formulaic than in past Sandler-Herlihy scripts, but the ultimate sense is of a guy finally coming of age.

Sandler remains an extraordinarily limited actor who glides by on puppy-dog charm and charisma, and whose climactic courtroom speech is not quite up to what the pic requires dramatically.

Adams, in a much less substantial turn than her amazing role in “Chasing Amy,” is in the Julia Roberts league when it comes to smiles but lacks a basic chemistry with Sandler.

Creating a seamless presence, the Sprouse twins avoid being overly cutesy.

Stewart is wasted in plot’s bookending scenes, while Mann and Swanson carry the unhappy load of playing bitches. Pic is rich, however, with supporting comedic talent, including Bologna, Mostel, Rob Schneider and Steve Buscemi as an obnoxious homeless guy.

Tech credits are slick and assured, with Teddy Castellucci providing the syrupy music and d.p. Theo Van de Sande lighting the proceedings with rich autumnal hues.

• Production: A Sony Pictures Entertainment release of a Columbia Pictures presentation of an Out of the Blue Entertainment/Jack Giarraputo production. Produced by Sid Ganis, Jack Giarraputo. Executive producers, Adam Sandler, Robert Simonds, Joseph M. Caracciolo. Co-producer, Alex Siskin. Directed by Dennis Dugan. Screenplay, Steve Franks, Tim Herlihy, Adam Sandler; story, Franks.
• Crew: Camera (Technicolor), Theo Van de Sande; editor, Jeff Gourson; music, Teddy Castellucci; production designer, Perry Andelin Blake; art director, Rick Butler; set decorator, Leslie Bloom; costume designer, Ellen Lutter; sound (Dolby/SDDS), Paul Massey, Chris Boyes; associate producers, Michelle Holdsworth, Allen Covert; assistant director, Glen Trotiner; casting, Roger Mussenden. Reviewed at Westwood Theater, L.A., June 16, 1999. MPAA Rating: PG-13. Running time: 95 MIN.
• With: Sonny Koufax - Adam Sandler Layla - Joey Lauren Adams Kevin - Jon Stewart Julian - Cole Sprouse, Dylan Sprouse Mr. Brooks - Josh Mostel Corinne - Leslie Mann Phil - Allen Covert Delivery Guy - Rob Schneider Vanessa - Kristy Swanson Mr. Koufax - Joe Bologna Tommy - Peter Dante Mike - Jonathan Loughran Homeless Guy - Steve Buscemi

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In Theaters

• Adam Sandler; Dennis Dugan; Joey Lauren Adams; Jon Stewart; Rob Schneider; twins Dylan and Cole Sprouse

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• Dennis Dugan

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• Columbia TriStar

Movie Review

Despite fierce summer competition, the comedy Big Daddy scored $41.5 million opening weekend. Why? Adam Sandler. Fans of sophomoric humor have made him a superstar. Here he conducts a clinic on how to corrupt a minor, then tries to redeem his character’s irresponsible behavior with drippy moralizing.

Living comfortably on a six-figure insurance settlement, 32-year-old Sonny Koufax (Sandler) is a career slacker. But when his lack of ambition threatens to cost him his girl, Sonny sets out to prove his maturity by adopting 5-year-old Julian. He teaches the boy to use profanity, urinate in public, fire a slingshot, play poker, scam supermarket discounts and trip rollerbladers for laughs. Some role model. After Sonny allows Julian to eat 30 packets of ketchup, you’re forced to wonder if the child wouldn’t be better off with social services.

Sonny’s pathetic parenting isn’t without conscience. He’s occasionally warm and caring. He tells kids to avoid drugs and alcohol. After failing in his permissiveness, he’s willing to work to undo the damage. Big Daddy also shows the consequences of a one-night stand and supports owning up to mistakes.

That said, this mean-spirited movie is loaded with profanity and anatomical humor. Also, Sonny wakes up beside a barely clad woman, and his gay law school chums are openly affectionate (Sandler plays the “tolerant” friend). Add obscene gestures, a joke about gay porn and Sonny’s combustible temper (violent threats and outbursts) and parents have reason to keep kids away from this inept father figure. Even Roger Ebert called the film “creepy and unwholesome.”

Bob Smithouser

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Big Daddy (1999)

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32-year-old Sonny Koufax (Adam Sandler) is a law school graduate who is steadfastly avoiding the pressures of adult responsibilities. As the lone holdout among his group of law school buddies, he eschews the career and marriage fast track for a part-time job, the neighborhood sports bar and endless take-out meals. Even his roommate and old law school buddy, Kevin (Jon Stewart), is joining the ranks of the grown-ups by proposing to his longtime girlfriend, Corinne (Leslie Mann), who's eternally at odds with Sonny and whose former life as a Hooters waitress is always good for a chuckle. The only people who appreciate Sonny's unique outlook on life are Corinne's beautiful sister, Layla (Joey Lauren Adams), a hard-working attorney, and Sonny's longtime take-out food delivery guy (Rob Schneider), who's practically achieved the status of a third roommate. In a misguided attempt to impress his girlfriend, Vanessa (Kristy Swanson), and prove he's ready for responsibility, Sonny adopts a five-year old boy, Julian (Cole and Dylan Sprouse), under the false pretense of being his biological father. When the plan doesn't work out and Vanessa leaves him anyway, Sonny tries to "return" the kid to Social Services. Faced with placing Julian in a children's home until the agency finds a suitable foster family, Sonny agrees to take care of him for the time being. Although plunged into the unknown territory of sleep deprivation, irritating children's songs and bedwetting, Sonny soon embraces his role as a temporary dad taking an unconventional approach to child rearing. But the ruse eventually catches up with him when Social Services discovers he isn't Julian's real father. In an attempt to keep the boy he has grown to love and make their relationship legal and permanent, Sonny surprises himself, his family and friends as he comes to learn and accept real-life responsibility.

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Big Daddy Review

01 Oct 1999

From hooligan golfer to drinks carrier, via wedding reception crooner and grown-bloke-back-at-school hijinks, perhaps the most remarkable thing about Saturday Night Live comedian Sandler's burst to box office heights is that it's all been done off the back of the same routine - a dysfunctional but lovable loser learns a few life lessons, gets the girl and saves whatever requires saving. But, hey, if it ain't broke...

Here's how the pertinent details bolt to formula this time around: professional layabout Sonny (Sandler) has reached the age of 32 without getting married or using his law school degree. In an ill-judged effort to impress his departing girlfriend, Vanessa (Kristy Swanson), Sonny reaches an agreement with his flatmate, Kevin (Stewart), to take custody of his illegitimate five-year-old son, Julian (played jointly by twins Cole and Dylan Sprouse). The (new) girl is snowed-under attorney, Layla (Adams). The lesson is taking responsibility for one's actions and in this case, that means Julian's childhood.

It's a sweet construct in which, as ever, the world is that safe, cartoonish version of reality - hurling logs in the path of speeding roller-bladers is satisfyingly amusing, while the American legal and social services systems seem to operate on a chaotically arbitrary and scarily trusting basis. But it manages to be quite consistently funny, with each juvenile gag balanced by the odd spark of wit and outrageousness - although a courtroom finale allowing Sandler and his writers to get their father-son relationship themes out of their systems, is predictably and excruciatingly hamfisted.

Kevin Smith fave Adams is delightful and should, with any luck, start swiping some decent roles back from Renee Zellweger after this; and on the cute kid(s) front, the Sprouse siblings manage quite a winning and irritation-free performance. But this, of course, is Sandler's show, once again held together by his curious yet addictive everyman charm: noisy, American loutishness played with just the right blend of vigour and humility.

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Big Daddy Parent Guide

Sandler's latest jerk-of-all-trades is named Sonny. This law school graduate has won a $200,000 wrongful injury settlement, and now chooses to do nothing except work one day a week at a tollbooth.

Release date June 25, 1999

Run Time: 93 minutes

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The guide to our grades, parent movie review by rod gustafson.

If one of Adam Sandler’s characters lived down your street, you’d likely have called the police a few times to charge him with public mischief, instructed your children to not go near him, and if he were a father—as he attempts to be in this epic—you would probably have the number for the local child welfare authorities memorized. Yet, when we put this dysfunctional character on a movie screen, people will pay a fortune to see him—as evidenced by the $40 million (and still growing) success of Big Daddy.

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Rod Gustafson

Big daddy parents' guide.

Is it only a movie? Many would argue that Sandler’s anti-social antics are hilarious on screen, and even though they would never tolerate someone doing these things in reality, they still find them acceptable because it is only entertainment. Yet, with many young people being attracted to this type of film, can these imitative behaviors become real?

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Very good movie, immature but with good morality.

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Opinion of a 4 year old

Movie Review

Plot Summary

Film review.

This could have been an awesome movie. But don't get me wrong, I have to admit I really liked the film. But like with most reviews I do, I have some bones to pick and some info to warn you about...

Big Daddy is a semi-typical Hollywood comedy with what I no will call "The Liar Liar Twist." The LL Twist is a 90s Hollywood comedy filled with objectionable material, but with a decent/good message and some heart to the film. Allow me to elaborate.

In 1997's Liar Liar starring Jim Carrey , Carrey plays a lawyer who can't lie for a day due to his 5 year old son's birthday wish. The film is laden with the typical swearing and sexually-related humor. But the underlying message of the film is anti-lying and pro-family. In 1999's Big Daddy , a film in some ways more offensive (I'll explain shortly), Sandler's character Sonny learns responsibility and love through caring for Julian, resulting in a touching ending that although doesn't seem right for the rest of the film's content, it is rather needed to overcome the negative perverse humor.

The language was pretty heavy with constant "s" words (at least a dozen), and "a" words, which some were used by the 5 year old boy. Also whenever Sonny and Kevin's fiancé' got engaged in a conversation, they were always bickering and calling each other names and Sonny relentlessly reminded her of her previous job at Hooter's restaurant (now with her being a dentist). So the terms "hooters," "boobs," and "hooterific" were used many times. Also, 2 characters issued the middle finger at 2 different times during the film. As such, the sexual innuendo/content was unfortunately present, especially when Sonny finds out Vanessa's cheating on him. Also, on another disappointing note, immorality is evident with the fact that Sonny and Vanessa were seen in bed together (just sleeping, but implying they have sex), Vanessa staying with another man, and Kevin admitting to having sex with a girl in Toronto after getting drunk at a party. All things that hindered the film from being better than it should have been.

The movie was very funny and enjoyable (especially when the gay guys weren't on the screen), and the presence of Julian never got annoying, but actually garnished plenty of "awwwww"'s from the crowd due to his pitiful cuteness. Gross humor prevailed once again. From Julian vomiting and it being shown falling to the floor and splattering to several scenes of Julian, occasionally accompanied by Sonny, peeing on a wall or a tree. And in the first scene where Sonny teaches Julian to do this, we see their urine streams, from behind them, running down the wall and pooling beneath them.

One plus were three cameos during the film. Rob Schneider was great as Sonny's immigrant delivery friend. Steve Buscemi was also great as a homeless man on the street. And Jon Stewart's role as Sonny's best friend was unfortunately short. Although all these cameos were present, their duration could have been longer.

So, as usual, if you have any questions about the film before you see it, feel free to contact me .

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What You Need To Know:

Ultimately moral worldview where slacker adult assumes responsibility for child, giving him love, protection & nurturing, with many pagan elements used for comic effect & the inclusion of a homosexual couple as major supporting players; 38 obscenities (mild & strong), 10 profanities, man & boy urinate outside, boy vomits, & lewd gestures; very little action violence including man throws himself in front of stopping car for comic effect, man puts stick in path of rollerblader causing rollerblader to fall & implied killing of pigeons by boy with slingshot (images of dead pigeons); implied fornication, a homosexual kiss & some sexual talk; woman in underwear & many cleavage shots; alcohol use; and, smoking.

More Detail:

Riding the current wave of gross-out comedies, Adam Sandler has troubles with lots of body fluids from a small boy who comes under his care in BIG DADDY. Except for the adorableness of the boy and the ultimately moral conclusion of the storyline, BIG DADDY is filled with groaner, sickout jokes that are only mildly forgivable because they come primarily from a small child, who doesn’t have full control over himself.

Sandler plays 32-year-old Sonny Koufax, who is avoiding adult responsibilities as much as he can, despite getting a law degree. Sonny also avoids career, marriage and cleaning up his apartment in favor of the neighborhood sports bar and endless take-out meals. His roommate, old law school buddy Kevin (Jon Stewart), proposes marriage to his longtime girlfriend Corinne (Leslie Mann), who constantly bickers with Sonny and whose former life included the chucklesome job of a Hooters waitress.

When Sonny’s girlfriend Vanessa (Kristy Swanson) leaves him for a much older man, Sonny adopts a 5-year-old boy named Julian (Cole and Dylan Sprouse), under the false pretense of being his biological father. (Julian’s mother is recently deceased.) Vanessa is nonplussed and doesn’t return to Sonny, so Sonny is stuck with a child for whom he doesn’t really know how to care.

When Julian wets the bed and gets sick, Sonny merely lays newspaper over on top of it. When Julian has to go to the bathroom while walking around the town, Sonny takes him to the side of a building that refused them bathroom entry, and they do their business against the wall. Sonny lets Julian wear and eat pretty much anything he wants and calls Julian “Frankenstein.” Eventually, Sonny grows to love and appreciate the child.

Meanwhile, Sonny shines up to Corinne’s lawyer sister Layla (Joey Lauren Adams). Layla teaches Sonny how to be more responsible with Julian, but Social Services finally discovers he isn’t Julian’s real father. Sonny takes all of his legal counselors (i.e., his friends including a homosexual couple) to court to try to persuade the judge that he is the best person to raise Julian.

The good news about BIG DADDY is that there is no nudity nor depicted sex, and not even much sexual talk. In fact, as Sonny woos Layla, all he asks for is a kiss. (It is implied, however, that he had a sexual relationship with Vanessa.) Unlike the other PG-13 comedy, AUSTIN POWERS: THE SPY WHO SHAGGED ME, this movie has no humor about genitals.

Other good news is that Sonny is corrected and changes regarding some major snafus in child care. (However, like movies such as THE MASK, the entertainment is mostly placed on the bumbling errant version of the same person.) Every irresponsible act he does, he corrects later in the movie. Like the best romantic comedies, Sonny also sloughs off selfishness and irresponsibility and faces up to marriage and raising children. Finally, any woman who is thinking of working at a Hooters restaurant will probably not want to do so after seeing this movie, because it makes a lot of fun of those who do and reveals it to be the degrading job that it is.

The bad news about BIG DADDY is, of course, all the body and toilet humor. In addition to that which was already mentioned, Sonny makes jokes about cleaning up after toilet use and making luggees, basically long strings of spit. Even worse, however, is the many obscenities this movie uses, 38 total, a huge number for a PG-13 movie. This indicates how bad the rating system has become.

Like Mike Meyers of AUSTIN POWERS fame, Adam Sandler is a SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE alum who has found an increasingly larger audience with his sophomoric humor. As long as audiences are skewing young, and the body humor is mixed with a sense of heart and warmth (unlike the bomb BaseKETBALL), the sky seems to be the limit for Meyers and Sandler. Crowds cheered at BIG DADDY, but because it also suggests that we all must grow up, it may be that Adam Sandler eventually will transition to more mature fair, such as what Jim Carrey is now doing. Meanwhile, he brings in the howls and the bucks with small guffaws.

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Reviewed by: Kara Kelly CONTRIBUTOR

“B ig Daddy” is another typical Adam Sandler movie. Humor, stupidity, and a no-thought plot. There were times when I did find some humor, but the occurrence was rare and soon forgotten. The cast of characters were some familiar faces from Saturday Night Live , and some not so familiar faces.

“Big Daddy” is the story of a “loser” named Sonny who doesn’t work and is trying to change his partying, lazy lifestyle for his girlfriend and move on past high school (been there and done that with his previous movies). So he decides to attempt to raise a foster child named Julian. To help in his parenting , Sonny enlists the help of his two homosexual school buddies and an illiterate, illegal alien delivery boy.

Sonny has no clue about how to treat Julian or be a good role model, but just the same they end up becoming great pals. After completely corrupting the child, Sonny becomes attached to Julian and would like to adopt him. As the movie progresses, Sonny becomes more mature and his whole life changes. Well, maybe not.

I do not recommend viewing “Big Daddy”, unless you are a die hard Adam Sandler fan. The PG-13 rating is underrated. There are many references to certain parts of the human anatomy and not only referred by Sandler and his cohorts, but this poor child as well. They take a five year old child and make him a foul mouth and call it cute. There is also a lot of swearing. I guess it got the PG-13 rating because there is no sex or actual nude bodies, but many references to both. Don’t bother with this one.

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