The Change-Up

This R-rated take on the old Freaky Friday body-switch movie is not as bad as you might think from looking at the poster, seeing the trailer, or hearing the single sentence description, but it also lacks enough substance or perspective to justify its existence.  Perhaps if Jason Batemen and Ryan Reynolds’ characters weren’t such caricatures--the boring-stick-in-the-mud and the irresponsible-party-guy--there might be something to this film that you can’t get from any of the PG versions (apart from CGI tits). But the movie doesn’t take advantage of the older audience it is made for by exploring anything even remotely interesting about married life or single life.  Instead it panders to us with scatological and sexual gross-out gags that feel desperate to surprise and shock.