DVD Reviews

The Switch – Blu-ray Review

By June L. Mar 18, 2011, 21:10 GMT

Jennifer Aniston stars alongside Jason Bateman in this offbeat comedy as Kassie, a smart, fun-loving single woman who, despite her neurotic best friend Wally\'s (Bateman) objections, decides it\'s time to have a baby - even if it means doing it herself...with a little help from a charming sperm donor (Patrick Wilson). But, unbeknownst to her, Kassie\'s plans go awry because of a last-minute switch that isn\'t discovered until seven years ...more

Single career woman Kassie has decided that she wants to have a baby, and she is going to do it via a sperm donor.  Her longtime friend Wally doesn’t think this is such a good idea, but then he never takes a risk, so what could he know? 

Kassie finds a donor and throws herself an “I’m Getting Pregnant Party” but sometime during the evening the donor’s contribution is switched for Wally’s. 

Wally (Jason Bateman) has always been in love with Kassie (Jennifer Aniston), but as his boss Leonard is quick to tell him, he missed his chance with her and she has put him in the “friend zone.” 

The night of the party, Wally gets really inebriated because he can’t stand the thought of Kassie having Roland’s (Patrick Wilson) baby, and in a series of misadventures in the bathroom, it is his deposit not Roland’s that Kassie eventually uses. 

They all part ways once Kassie is pregnant, as she feels like going home to be near loving grandparents is a necessity for her child.  Seven years pass, and Kassie comes back to New York with her son Sebastian (Thomas Robinson). 

The audience already knows that Sebastian is Wally’s son, so there are all kinds of similarities to be seen and enjoyed, but Kassie and Wally are clueless.  Eventually Wally puts it together, but then he faces the problem of when to tell Kassie. 

This film has a great cast with some good lines and some really fine moments.  Any scene between Wally and Sebastian is worth its weight in gold!  Overall it is entertaining and sweet, but could have benefited from stronger writing, especially in the scenes between Kassie and Wally. 

Yes, good friends talk in a shorthand type speech, but the audience doesn’t know the code, and some of their dealings with each other were confusing.  Perhaps it was the style of the film, but it felt as though the audience just dropped into the middle of these people’s lives, without much of a clue to their back story to make them really understand and care about what happened. 

It was hard to believe that Wally didn’t remember making the switch…..his scene with Leonard the next day seemed like a put on more than an actual lapse of memory.  He seemed to be covering up his embarrassment for having made a scene, and that he knew exactly what he had done. 

Therefore, it was hard to believe that he didn’t recognize Sebastian immediately as his son.  But that is simply one viewpoint, there are many who adored this film, calling it one of the best ever for its stars. 

It was enjoyable, and does have some scenes that are really good, and all the actors did fine jobs with the material that they were given.  Of special note were scenes that involved acting without words, these moments where their facial expressions really gave the story life were captivating.

The Switch Blu-ray is presented on single disc with a running time of 101 minutes.  The specials included are deleted scenes introduced by the directors, along with an alternate ending again with their introduction.  A featurette “The Switch Conceived” gives a back stage, behind the scenes look at the filming using New York locations.  

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