Brendon Jones
It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.
Casey Duggan
It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny
Alistair Olson
After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.
edwagreen
My major criticism of this 1953 film was that it should have run longer. It should have shown Dirk move back gradually into the field of architecture and get the girl portrayed by Nancy Olson. When the picture ends, neither has occurred.In the 1950s Jane Wyman was in somber mode. After garnering the Oscar for "Johnny Belinda," in 1948, she followed that up with another nomination for the all-time tear-jerker "The Blue Veil," in 1951 and the remake of "Magnificent Obsession," the year after 'Big.' "All that Heaven Allows" came in '56 and "Miracle in the Rain" completed her tear-jerking screen performances.In this film she suffers the heartbreak of the losses of her father and husband, the latter a dirt farmer. As her husband, Sterling Hayden captured the essence of the simplistic life.I wonder if this picture were trying to emulate O.E. Rolvaag's "Giants in the Earth," a marvelous book about mid-western farming with its trials and tribulations.As taught by her father in the film, Wyman becomes a rugged individualist. She is a strong, firm believer in achieving by yourself what you are destined to do. She teaches those principles to her son who disappoints her by going into the sales portion of architecture instead of the profession itself after college.Wyman never lets son Steve Forrest know of her disappointment and he comes to realize how right she was. Martha Hyer is her usual upper-class matron with values consisting of making the big dollars.This is still another of Wyman's gut-wrenching performances, but she had better in the films mentioned above. Still, this is a story of perseverance, hard work, and endurance.
marcslope
While practically nobody else was doing so, Edna Ferber was writing women who didn't accept their lot in life, challenged men, proved more mature and responsible than men, and maintained their femininity while doing so. An archetypal Ferber woman is the heroine of "So Big," played, a little monotonously, by Jane Wyman. (She's too old to be convincing as a young girl, and too young to be a convincing timeworn old woman.) Sprawling through decades of American history like so many Ferber doorstop novels, it's fine melodrama, though oddly shaped--many years of Selina's existence are just missing, and the third act, with son Steve Forrest chasing after Nancy Olson, feels like an afterthought, as do many of the supporting characters, played by a mostly no-name cast. Sterling Hayden, as the love of Wyman's life, is an odd character, too--he clearly loves Selina, yet laughs at her attempts at betterment and is a terrible chauvinist; you feel Ferber kills him off because she honestly doesn't know what to do with him. An uncharacteristically unmemorable Max Steiner score grinds in the background, the photography is a black-and-white eyeful, and the biggest surprise is how good young Richard Beymer is, as an adolescent with a crush on Wyman--eight years later, again under Robert Wise's direction, he starred in "West Side Story," and was terrible.
Neil Doyle
Despite the above cited drawback, this Edna Ferber story of a mother's love with that stifling title, SO BIG, seems aimed at the tear ducts to give JANE WYMAN another chance to show how well she can age from young woman to maturity to old age with a nice array of expressions and changes of hairdo and make-up.She's really the best thing about SO BIG. It's story is a simple, even trite saga of a woman who wants all the best things for her son, especially since she has to rear him single-handedly once her husband (farmer STERLING HAYDEN) dies. Hayden gives such a persuasive performance that once he's gone, the picture suffers from his untimely death and the remaining scenes never achieve the same intensity of the earlier ones. Brief performances from dependable players like NANCY OLSON, MARTHA HYER and a very young RICHARD BEYMER help sustain interest in the long-winded plot.There is an appropriately agreeable score by Max Steiner to emphasize the soap suds and the usual dramatics, but this somehow misses the mark as what should have been a superior vehicle of its kind despite having all the trimmings.STEVE FORREST, as Wyman's "so big" son, has moments when his resemblance to real-life brother Dana Andrews is remarkable. Unfortunately, his role is poorly written without giving him the chance to show much acting range.
ralphsampson
Remarkable soaper gets bravura lead performance by Jane Wyman. The scenes in New Holland are excellent with young Richard Beymer a standout as a student who has a crush on Wyman. Steve Forrest is excellent as Wyman's son. Martha Hyer is a bit out of her league as the would-be vamp seeking to lead Forrest astray. But, why quibble? The production values are first-rate, the writing is excellent, and the score is magnificent.
