The following are '80s classics I grew up with which are similarly sci-fi/fantasy and equally heartwarming:
Batteries Not Included: Apartment block tenants seek the aid of alien mechanical life-forms to save their building from demolition.
Splash: A young man is reunited with a mermaid who saves him from drowning as a boy and falls in love not knowing who/what she is.
Innerspace: A hapless store clerk must foil criminals to save the life of the man who, miniaturized in a secret experiment, was accidentally injected into him.
Short Circuit: Number 5 of a group of experimental robots in a lab is electrocuted, suddenly becomes intelligent, and escapes.
Chances Are: The daughter of a grief-stricken widow becomes romantically involved with a young man who may be the woman's dead husband, reincarnated.!
And if you enjoyed Big, that same year there were several similarly-themed films -- 18 Again! (teenager switches bodies with grandfather), Vice Versa (father and son switch bodies), Like Father, Like Son (father and son switch bodies). In 1988, there was also the TV movie 14 Going on 30, about a boy who uses a "growth accelerator" to make himself appear older than his actual age, in an attempt to seduce his teacher. It sounds creepy, but it's actually a cute movie. Incidentally, WTF was going on at the time that saw the release of all those similar movies?
Lastly, this one is more recent but nonetheless is as magical and heartwarming -- Big Fish, about a young man trying to deconstruct his father's tall tales.
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