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Brian Weathersby (PAUL DANO) is a 28 year-old salesman at a high-end Swedish mattress company. The afterthought child to elderly parents (ED ASNER, JANE ALEXANDER), and the youngest son in a trio of successful brothers, a shady oil man (IAN ROBERTS), a surgeon (ROBERT STANTON), Brian is searching for his place in the world. Unfulfilled by his work he spends a good portion of his day pursuing his goal of someday adopting a baby from China. He gets swept up in a romance with the lovely but misguided Harriet Lolly (ZOOEY DESCHANEL) when she comes in to his store one day and falls asleep on one of the beds. To win her over, he must compete with her bear of a father, Al Lolly, (JOHN GOODMAN) an art-collecting loudmouth with a bad back and deep pockets. GIGANTIC is a funny, surreal love story about the anxiety that comes when two people with crazy families collide unexpectedly and fall for each other.

Aselton says that, as the youngest child in his family, he wanted his parents to adopt a Chinese baby so that he could have a younger sibling. He and co-writer Adam Nagata were fascinated by the idea and built the story around Brian's wanting to adopt a baby. Aselton and Nagata, college friends who both come from literary backgrounds, aimed to write the film as novelistic and surrealist rather than expository. They wanted to show "those little things that are often found in literature but rarely in film", such as Brian and his father's age difference and how it affects their relationship, and Harriet's walking around in her underpants and how it affects her and Brian's relationship. Aselton chose the title Gigantic because "There's an innocence about the [word]" due to its use by young children to describe something fantastic. He felt that the title was "a juxtaposition against Brian's life changing decision to adopt a baby".

The script languished for several years before the film went into production, when producer Mindy Goldberg brought the script to Christine Vachon of Killer Films. Aselton said the most challenging part of making the film was casting the two lead roles of Brian and Harriet. Paul Dano liked the script and was one of the first actors to sign on, which attracted others to join the cast. Aselton said that Dano was one of the first to audition for the role and the first to understand the story; Deschanel was the second actor to understand, and so both were cast. As a director of commercials, Aselton brought many of his former crew members with him to work on Gigantic. Filming began on March 3, 2008 and lasted for 23 days; most of production took place in New York City but several scenes were filmed in Connecticut. Filming locations included Brooklyn Heights' Cadman Plaza West and Cobble Hill, Brooklyn's Quercy restaurant.

The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 9, 2008. Following its screening at American Film Market, First Independent Pictures bought the film's North American distribution rights. It will screen at the at the Cornell University Cinema on February 14, 2009 and at the AFI Dallas International Film Festival in March before its theatrical release on April 3, 2009.

• Official Movie Web Site

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