Big - LIVE BLOGGING EDITION

Big is a great movie and reminds everyone that Tom Hanks started out his career honing his comedic chops which I believe helped him establish his later more mature 'Every Man' roles which he often handled with just a sprinkle of deft humor.

:17 - Josh is playing some extremely old shitty text based computer game. Its also interesting that his parents are yelling at him because you hear his dad yell at him to "listen to his mother" since you never see the father in the entire film. Not even a shot of him worried since you know, his son has disappeared.

1:47 - Josh's friend "Billy" is that red headed kid who also starred in Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. Wonder where he is now?

2:44 - Cynthia is the Young Josh love interest. She is not really even cute...and she falls into the stupid 80's paradigm of 'I'm wearing a stupid jean jacked and bad hair but I'm supposed to be cute'

3:55 - Josh and Billy live next door to each other so they can talk to each other via walkie talkie. Now that I think about it, I wish I could have had this happen when I was younger.

4:58 - I lied, I guess I just saw Josh's father when he is at the carnival. His dad is carrying his baby sister. And directly after this scene we have the scene that causes the whole movie. He wants to go on the 'scary' ride with his dream girl Cynthia but he is too short. This is the type of incident that would scar you for life...but imagine if he does get on the ride. Not only does the entire not movie take place, but Big Josh aka Tom Hanks doesn't get laid later. I mean in reality (and I'll get into this later) but Josh is what, in sixth or seventh grade max and he's already had sex with a mature older woman and had a loving relationship, worked for a major company in New York, and owned a swank Manhattan loft with at least 2000 square feet. Baller Status achieved and he is not even 16. I should also mention the Carny/Carnie is totally an asshole to Josh when he can't get on the ride.

8:20 - Josh runs into Zoltar and makes his wish! OH SHIT!!!!

10:55 - Josh is now big. I would have liked to have seen some really disturbing transformation scene where his bones stretch out and its all gruesome ala any werewolf movie ever.

15:03 - Funny scene where Josh comes into his house and his mom is vacuuming and she is obviously freaked out and he apologizes and goes and wipes his feet on the doormat. Then we cut to a scene where Billy is at the school playing basketball and he is terrible. He has a wise cracking PE Coach with a thick New York accent. Funny.

18:18 - A less explored aspect of this entire movie is that his parents think Josh is kidnapped. They rarely explore the psychological aspect of what his parents go through. Maybe his dad and mom got in a fight after he disappeared and thats why you don't see his dad the rest of the movie.

20:00 - So Josh and his young friend Billy roll into New York and they have a good scene in Times Square and its all sleazy and homeless people abound and Josh is accosted by both a beggar and hooker. If this takes place in 1987 or 88 when it was released this is still Pre-Guliani era and for New York marks a historically bad period of crime and crack and issues in New York. If Big took place today there is no way Josh could even afford a hotel room.

26:27 - Josh goes to a job interview at Macmillan Toy Company for a computer operator. He is filling out a resume/template sheet in the office. This rings false! He gets the job anyways because the HR guy thinks he went to GW.

28:45 - Forgot to mention that Jon Lovitz is in this movie. Very small role as a guy stuck in a computer cubicle next to Josh but yeah. I wonder if they hooked him up in this role/friends via SNL. Or perhaps this is before that time...not sure.

30:38 - Robert Loggia, my favorite evil father in law from Over the Top makes his first screen appearance and he is flanked by the Dad from Home Alone. I don't know his name and in the spirit of this live blogging experience I won't look it up yet.

32:30 - Cue touching moments...Josh calls home and then he sings that song to his mom over the phone of the song she used to sing to him. Him mom starts to cry. Directly after this we see Josh watching the French Connection and there is gun fire and crying etc...good movie and great scene. Then he shuts off the tv and the exact sounds occur outside his hotel room. Another good scene.

35:00 - Silly string scene. I kind of want to buy some now.

36:00 - F.A.O. Schwarz scene. I've never been there but still have a strong desire to be there. It's like how I always felt about Lego Land until..you know, I got to go there.

38:15 - So we've hit the iconic piano playing scene. Probably the most famous scene from this movie and I would actually put it in a top 500 iconic film scenes ever in film history. I am almost positive that if this was on in a bar or some tv display at Best Buy, people would naturally watch it and not be able to contain at least a small grin. Not sure why, but it is charming. I must imagine though that this scene would have been a pain in the ass to film.

41:55 - Josh's secretary was I believe the mom from That 70's Show.

42:31 - I did actually pause the DVD here because there is a shot of Josh on the milk carton being missing. It looks like it says he was born 1/28/76 and he disappeared on 9/12/87. That makes him 11...so thats uhh, 5th grade?

43:11 - Elizabeth Perkins/Susan begins to see the childish charm in Josh during a market report in which he states "I Don't Get It?" Susan is also wearing a lot of great 80's power woman clothes. Although I haven't noticed any hardcore shoulder pads yet.

46:45 - I don't remember this but evidently there is a musical montage sequence of Josh having fun with his new money etc. being at a Yankees game and if I'm not mistaken this is Huey Lewis and The News.

48:45 - Party time for corporate MacMillan. Josh is about to roll in with his badass tux. And if I'm not mistaken Josh is about to seriously put the moves on Susan. Jon Lovitz dances bad, Josh eats a lot of gross shit and doesn't know how to eat mini corn etc. I actually find this entire sequence a bit tiring. I mean yeah, its more fish out of water crap but I like how Susan is bored of Mr. Home Alone Dad and wants to just get her freak on/move up the corporate ladder by fucking Josh. So yeah she starts out as a bitch but then learns to LOVE!!! It is funny how Josh ignores her come ons though and is hyped to be in a LIMO. I think I'm kind of the same way. If I get in a LIMO I'll immediately be more excited about whatever I'm doing. If I'm going to a root canal in a LIMO I'd be more excited.

56:19 - Ok he has a bunk bed and more sexual moves go by. Top bunk etc. I feel like i'm summarizing the movie right now and thats not what the point of this was about. He does have a pepsi machine in his room which is fucking awesome . I guess I'm still stuck in arrested development where I think 90 percent of what Josh has in his apartment is awesome.

1:04:40 - We're officially entering the part of the movie where it gets too sappy...or as I call it, THE TIME SCOTT STOPS WATCHING THIS MOVIE WHEN ITS ON CABLE AND STARTS CHANNEL SURFING. This is a movie where the parents can take their kids to the movie and the kid laughs at the slapstick stuff but the parents can get a little bit of a love story.

Susan starts falling for Josh's boying (GET IT..BOYISH!!!) charm. Little does she know she is committing statutory rape. And then we get the stomach punch moment a minute later as she is dumping Mr. Home Alone Dad and says that Josh, "IS A GROWN UP!!" GET IT?!?!

1:12:43 - Yeah I'm pretty much hard up on comments at this point. It has turned into touching scenes of emotional connection. I'm a bitter cold husk of a human being though so these scenes have no effect on me!!!

1:14:00 - Josh touches his first boob.

1:32:44 - I've kind of zoned out a bit but here we are. Josh has gone back to the Zoltar machine and is about to wish that he was a young kid again. Of course over the course of these scene and the last few we have Susan dealing with the fact that she fell in love with a Man-Child. It has to be a bit humiliating. I mean how does she go on knowing that the one relationship in her life has pretty much been a sham!!? Also, Josh just comes through with his true age that he is only 13.

1:38:33 - Okay this next scene bothers me. Josh is getting dropped off in his neighborhood by Susan and he is wearing a suit. The camera cuts and he is now all of a sudden young Josh again immediately. First of all, the transformation happening that fast rings false and going back to the opening transformation scene which happened to coincide with a freak storm indicates that something supernatural was occuring. So I guess the storm was just a coincidence?

The ending scene is Josh back with his old red headed buddy walking down the street talking about stick ball. Its worth noting that the original ending was to be Josh in class and then a new young girl is introduced in the class and its heavily implied that Susan had wished herself young. If that had been the ending...that would have been terrible.

And now finally checking wikipedia/imdb it appears a special edition has been released that has extended footage with over 20 minutes of new scenes. I should get that. I should also point out I don't hate the love story in this movie and it provides the last 1/3rd of the movie with a great emotional arc. But once you really start thinking about how Josh is just 13, it does start getting plain freaky!