Review by planktonrules

Paul Robeson was an amazing man. During an age when black men were, at best, second-rate, he managed to excel in so many ways--graduating from a top college at the top of his class, a four-letter man, aster of 20 languages, professional athlete, a lawyer and one of the greatest singers of his age. Considering how much he accomplished in the repressive early to mid-20th century, you wonder just how far he might have gone had he been born a half century later.

While Robeson only made a few films, most of them are wonderful...though sadly "Big Fella" is not wonderful in any way except for the singing. Even the nice and seemingly effortless performance by Robeson and his amazing singing isn't enough to support this film--mostly because the plot sucks. It's obvious that the plot was secondary and was just an excuse to have him sing-often at the most bizarre times. But, considering how dumb the whole kidnapping plot was and how obnoxious the little jerk was, it was hard to care one bit about the film. On top of that, it was obvious that British Lion Films simply didn't care much about the production, as it was supposed to take place in Marseilles but practically everyone either has a strong American accent or British one. Aside from a few stock pieces of footage, it's pretty obvious this was made in a UK studio. A dumb plot, annoying and one-dimensional characters and low production values really sink this film. It's a shame and a film clearly beneath Robeson's immense talents.