You know what kind of movie “The Change-Up” is? It’s the kind of movie where the heroes park their car in the front of every building, shut the doors without locking them and don't get towed despite the fact the “No Parking” sign is accidentally in the frame.
To do something like this isn’t just about being lazy, it’s about being boring. Usually, the ability to park everywhere is just a magical part of Hollywood, but it is one of those clichés everyone recognizes. This parking nitpick extends to the rest of the film; anyone who has ever seen a film can guess where it's going.
Jason Bateman plays Dave, a family man who has to wake up at 3 a.m. to change diapers only to go to his successful law firm several hours later. What hell he lives in. Ryan Reynolds is Mitch, who smokes pot all day and is incredibly crass. They envy each other’s lives, which means they will switch bodies so they can learn some stupid lesson.
This stupid lesson — in which they must recognize their own lives are pretty great — is so forced that the characters should start to become paranoid that planet Earth is reshaping itself to teach them this stupid lesson.
Q: Why was a magic fountain moved out of a park and into a location of which no one has any record? A: For they need to learn to respect their old lives.
Q: Why does Mitch’s dad awkwardly want to have lunch with Dave — who is secretly Mitch but he doesn't know that — to talk about all the things he always wanted to say to Mitch even though it’s not clear that Dave and Mitch’s dad even know each other? A: Mitch needs to learn a stupid lesson.
Q: Why does Dave’s wife only talk about Dave’s life goals when she’s upset? A: So that Dave in Mitch’s body can learn a stupid lesson.
Q: How did Dave’s boss come up with a PowerPoint about Dave’s life that covers his childhood and marriage but never discusses his job, which is how the boss actually knows Dave? A: BECAUSE MITCH AS DAVE NEEDS TO LEARN A STUPID LESSON.
Everything is so contrived that it really makes more sense if they were part of a "Truman Show"-esque conspiracy where even baseball games are formed to make sure they learn a lesson. Every secondary character is irrelevant, but the way this movie portrays women is irredeemable.
The women characters defy science by being zero-dimensional. Leslie Mann is a hysterical actress who seems embarrassed to say what’s written in the script. Anything that is wrong with her marriage to Dave is all about how Dave isn’t fulfilling his dreams and nothing about what she wants. When she is the most upset, it is because Dave (BUT REALLY IT’S MITCH!!!) says she isn't attractive to him after an extended poop scene.
Olivia Wilde is a legal secretary who has a crush on Dave but then goes on a forced date with Mitch to save her job (It makes zero sense). Then she falls for Mitch (BUT HE’S REALLY DAVE!!!!). Then on the second date, she changes all of the things she’s attracted to, so she’s more interested in Mitch. This was only done so the leads can both have someone attractive at the end.
Hiring an actress like Wilde only to be attractive is such a common practice in these worthless shallow films that nobody raises an eyebrow. My eyebrows were raised when actresses hired to be attractive bared their breasts (and, in one case, pregnant belly) via CGI. Instead of actual nudity, Mann and Wilde have CGI breasts exposed.
The CGI budget doesn’t end there. “The Change-Up” also wisely spends millions on some of the worst green-screen driving, a CGI baby throwing a knife with super-strength so it can go through a door and a CGI baby butt that propels CGI green poop.
All of this could have been excused if the movie just did one thing. (Well, almost all …). It just had to be funny. Have jokes that landed. Instead, this is just a pathetic extension of uncreative profanity, tired situations and a movie that works hard to be a complete mess. I hate that I have seen this movie.
The extras are also stupid. There is a weird gag reel where it isn’t about actors laughing and ruining a take but about how most of them didn’t bother to learn their lines. Then it ends with, “Thanks for a great shoot!” implying this was made for the wrap party, which is even weirder since they never showed it was fun to work on. There are also five more minutes added for an “unrated” edition, which is a bluff because it’s just worthless footage. There is also an unenthusiastic making-of and a feature commentary done only by director David Dobkin, which I haven’t had a chance to hear. But I hope most of it is him saying, “Ryan and Jason said they’ll be here any minute…”
Film: 0.5 Yaps Extras: 0.5 Yaps