The story of the story tells of two high school students, Michael and Matty, who are also good friends from the third grade. Both friends try to help each other influence before the big students' concert. It seems that things will change completely after a very short period of time when they suddenly turn into a different direction when Matte declares that he is an anomaly. Tragic situations may arise constantly when Matte tries to remain faithful to his sex but his friend tries to change it.
Like a fresh ripple in the near-stagnant high school movie pool, Chris Nelson's "Date and Switch" balances formula with winning performers, genuine humor and a generosity of spirit that this genre too often lacks.
In place of authentic emotion and searing personal communication, there's cliche and passivity, plasticizing the kindly nature of the picture to a point where all the tension begins to resemble a bad sitcom.
The film's forced quirkiness and repeated displays of bro-ism in action hinder the potential for a more subtle approach to the potentially challenging issue the story depicts.
Lame jokes (even when delivered by comedic vets like Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman) mixed with painfully paced sequences make this potential-filled rom-com fall flat.
In its sloppy humor and unabashedly earnest expressions of friendship and romance, the movie feels like any likable, and generally forgettable, teen comedy. And yet with its casually handled twist, the genre ambles forward just a little bit.
It's a movie about being true to yourself that's reluctant to let its real character show. At any point that it looks likely to tweak sex-comedy convention or get truly weird, it reverses course at the last minute.
The subject certainly isn't dated, but the film's dull post-John Hughes, sub-Judd Apatow style of comedy is like a just-buried time capsule full of accumulated clichés.
