THE SWITCH

Written by Allan Loeb

Directed by Josh Gordon and Will Speck

Starring Jason Bateman, Jennifer Aniston, Jeff Goldblum, Juliette Lewis and Patrick Wilson

Oh what a cynical, love starved world we live in today that a movie like THE SWITCH can be called a romantic comedy.  A) It is rarely, if ever, funny – not that is doesn’t make numerous, desperate attempts to be just that.  And B) there is absolutely nothing romantic about two aging friends who are so caught up in their own self-imposed neurosis that they cannot see how easy it could all be if they just saw each other for who they really are. It’s like they’ve given up but yet they’re asking us not to.

Poor Aniston is the go-to girl for single over 40 roles.

Jennifer Aniston is Kassie and Kassie wants a baby.  Kassie doesn’t have a boyfriend though; she just has a best friend named Wally (Jason Bateman), an aptly named wallower who has been in love with Kassie for years.  Rather than go the clichéd route of trying to have babies between besties, Kassie takes the other now clichéd approach by having a baby with a baster – y’know, of the turkey variety – instead.  She doesn’t need a man even though the one she wants is standing right in front of her but Wally will have none of this.  In one of those drunk moments that no one ever remembers the next day, he accidentally ruins the sperm sample Kassie wanted to use and replaces it with his own so as not to get caught.  It is essentially a horrible thing to do and an act that could end their friendship.  Hilarity is supposed to ensue but what does is a drawn out delay between the actual act and the inevitable reveal – oh and a lot of moping and complaining in between.

I suspect Bateman isn't faking it here.  He would have to be that drunk to make it through the shoot.

I cannot figure out how it took two directors to put this film together.  This is especially true when novice filmmakers, Josh Gordon and Will Speck (BLADES OF GLORY) don’t seem to have any clear direction between the two of them as to what they’re trying to say.  There is only one thing that makes THE SWITCH watchable and that is Jason Bateman.  As incredibly dry and uninspired as the whole thing is, Bateman manages to bring subtlety and humanity when there is none to be found.  We might know Wally; we may have even been him at some point in our lives.  We also probably don’t enjoy spending too much time with him either because he just drags us down.  Subsequently, so does THE SWITCH.