The Change-Up 2011

Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle: Pee-pee humor abounds in The Change-Up. There's also a lot of poo-poo humor. And ta-ta humor. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: Reynolds speaks in obscenities the way bad bakeries use cupcake icing, and Bateman is almost bitterly uptight. But the movie largely fulfills the promise of the swap. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: [It's] all over the place in tone, veering awkwardly from some daring comic moments to feel-good sappiness and back again in hopes of redeeming some semblance of edginess. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: There's one consolation, and that's in watching the stars play opposite what is 
 often their type of guy. Read more

Kathleen Murphy, MSN Movies: ...stifle your inner censor and give this half-smart, deliciously transgressive mess of a movie a chance. Read more

Stephen Holden, New York Times: The body-swapping premise, which is stale to begin with, isn't explored with any depth, unless you find meaningful Freudian subtext in the movie's relentless anal fixation. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: Has the moment finally arrived when we look back upon Freaky Friday as a model of comedic sophistication? Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: Talented people all, and either prisoners of the studio system, which will do anything it takes to reach an audience, or willing players in a soiled playpen. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: Ultimately, "The Change-Up" offers a few laughs, and fewer surprises. Read more

Tasha Robinson, AV Club: Has the faults of raucous recent scatological comedies like Bad Teacher, Horrible Bosses, and The Hangover Part II with none of their redeeming facets. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: It's hard not to be disappointed with "The Change-Up," which in the end follows the basic conventions of the switched-identity genre, if more profanely, changing up not much at all. Read more

Amy Nicholson, Boxoffice Magazine: If the trailer for The Change-Up looks bad -- and it does -- it's because Universal saved all the jokes for the actual movie. Read more

Michael Wilmington, Chicago Reader: They're good at their specialties -- Reynolds's casual jock studliness and Bateman's nervous white-collar introversion -- and they're even better at switching into the other guy's shtick and mannerisms. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: A lot of it, in fact, is hacky and repellent. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: Bateman, as always, is surpassingly good, even when the material isn't. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: I want to hate The Change-Up for its relentless scatology, its imaginative bankruptcy, its juvenile need to push every superficial content restriction to the outer limits. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: A thoroughly silly, intermittently hilarious reworking of the Freaky Friday body-switch concept. Read more

Kirk Honeycutt, Hollywood Reporter: The Change-Up bravely attempts to revive the dormant subgenre but it's a lame effort that grows increasingly frantic and foul-mouthed as the realization sets in that the gimmick isn't working. Read more

David Denby, New Yorker: This comedy doesn't work very well. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: Bateman and Reynolds never get into the hall-of-mirrors mimicry that Nicolas Cage and John Travolta so enjoyed in "Face/Off." Read more

Ian Buckwalter, NPR: The script values shock over wit so completely that every scene feels too eager for laughs, even with comic actors as likable as Bateman and Reynolds doing the shocking. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: The thing is, this could have been funny. Read more

Lou Lumenick, New York Post: As in Judd Apatow's phallocentric comic fantasies, the considerable raunch and implicit sexism of "The Change-Up" barely mask a worldview that's far from transgressive. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: The Change-Up drags on endlessly, held together with scatology, flatulence and masturbation. Read more

Carrie Rickey, Philadelphia Inquirer: The filmmakers are under the mistaken impression that in order for a gag to work, the audience should gag from the gross-out situation. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: It all seems a little tired and, more importantly, not as funny as it should be. Read more

Richard Roeper, Richard Roeper.com: Delivers consistent laughs, some sincerely touching moments. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: It has a low opinion of men, a lower opinion of women, and the lowest opinion of the intelligence of its audience. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Another body-switching comedy? Seriously? Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: It's occasionally funny and a lot painful... Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: With slight variants, this is another chapter in the epic saga of body shame, gender panic, and free-floating contempt for the human race that Hollywood comedies seem to be issuing piece by piece in serial format. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Universal Pictures has filed for creative bankruptcy. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: I still think it's a funny movie, but given its genes, it's a bit of a slacker. Read more

Jennie Punter, Globe and Mail: Freaky, yes, but definitely not Freaky Friday. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: The Change-Up, like so many American movies, feels like the product of sex-phobic 12-year-old boys whose response to the big, bad world is to run back to mommy's leg. Read more

Mary F. Pols, TIME Magazine: Raucous and entertaining but unexciting. Read more

Trevor Johnston, Time Out: You'd have to call the whole undertaking workmanlike rather than inspired. Read more

Linda Barnard, Toronto Star: The Change-Up goes downhill faster than a snowboarder strapped to a jetpack. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: While this raunchy Freaky Friday meets Trading Places has some laughs, it's more often frat-boy crass, frantic and formulaic. Read more

Justin Chang, Variety: While the reliable Ryan Reynolds and Jason Bateman wring some laughs from a creaky but durable setup... the script takes R-rated gross-out humor to such forced extremes that its later bid for sentimental sweetness feels disingenuous and unearned. Read more

Karina Longworth, Village Voice: Pivots on the discrepancy in life experience and hipness between an adult and an adolescent, and, uh, distinguishes itself by maintaining an extreme, puerile worldview while finding a way to wedge "adult language" into virtually every sentence Read more

Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: Jason Bateman and Ryan Reynolds struggle valiantly to transcend the movie they're in. Read more