Just perfect...

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Yes, it's probably just because it was a favorite as a kid, but I really like Big Business. It is still as entertaining as it was when I was younger. Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin do a great job in their dual roles and their comedic timing is excellent. This is a movie I'd like to own.

Reworking of the main gag in 1970's "Start the Revolution Without Me" has a rich couple from New York City, driving through a small southern town, checking into a bumpkin hospital where the wife delivers twins--two girls; at the same time, in the same befuddled hospital, a local woman also delivers twins--two girls. The joke, of course, is: one of the city babies is switched with one of the daughters from the farm family and, many years later, they all meet up at the Plaza Hotel. Bright, funny comedy, one of Bette Midler's better efforts for Touchstone, although it takes its time getting started. Once the action moves to the Plaza, it becomes less a vehicle for stars Midler and Lily Tomlin than a visual effects-driven farce with overtures to the 1930s. Tomlin's small town fussbudget is colorful, but her big city counterpart never takes shape, and she doesn't quite click with Midler (one may argue their characters are not related and therefore shouldn't click, but Tomlin's timing is very different from her co-star's, and she doesn't segue into brash slapstick comfortably). There's a great deal of incidental plotting revolving around the main action, with nutty characters continually popping up, but the jokes are freshest and funniest when director Jim Abrahams simply sets the camera on Bette Midler and lets her go. The editing is sloppy and abbreviates some of Midler's liveliest moments, yet Bette is very amusing when she's allowed to take charge. Fred Ward also appealing as a country rube who loves one or both of the Tomlins--although this pairing, too, lacks charisma (it's a plot device, like much of the rest of "Big Business"). *** from ****

In a small town, two sets of identical twins are born in the same hospital on the same night. One pair to a poor local family and the other pair to a rich family passing through the small town . The nurse on duty mixes the twins by mistake unbeknown to the parents. Flash forward to the eighties, and the twins are about to cross paths following a business deal to close down a factory that has mutual connotations the both pairs of twins.....Its a Bette Midler vehicle for sure, and the back end of the eighties were just hit after hit for her. But the quality wasn't always there, and despite Midler and Tom,in being really good, it's not got the venom that her other films had, a really dark streak was needed in this.What we get is a running joke of the nice Tomlin/Midler talking to someone, and then the not so nice Tomlin/Midler talking to the same person, leaving the camera on said person looking highly confused.Its funny the first couple of times, but then the film begins to rely on that one joke.It's typically eighties fodder, high heels, big hair, and shoulder pads, featuring a brilliant song during the end credits.It would probably hold some nostalgia value to someone who saw it when it first came out, but for me, it's pretty average stuff.

Big Business is one of the best examples of a movie that the critics hated, and the viewers loved. Such is the academic elitism of some critics. If a movie doesn't meet their rarefied standards of whatever it's a bad movie. Roger Ebert's review, for one, which is wrong headed on just about every count.My point: Lighten up! No it is not the most original or classic comedy ever made. It is the talents of Bette and Lilly that make the movie. What might have been clichéd with anyone else is just priceless with them. " Never funny when two people just miss each other?" It is, when the two people are Bette and Lilly! And "nothing happens" when they finally meet each other? Is he watching the same movie? When the four finally meet in the Plaza Hotel bathroom, I almost fell off the sofa laughing! I have no idea what he is talking about.The script is more than decent - a work of art, no - but WHO CARES?If you are in the mood for a light weight, but very funny comedy, I highly recommend Big Business.