The Change Up
“They've spent years wanting each other's lives. One morning, they get them.”
Director
David Dobkin
Release
16 September 2011
Runtime
112 Minutes
Certificate
15
Synopsis
Dave and Mitch grew up together but became very different adults. Dave has responsibility everywhere. His career demands enormous amounts of his time. His marriage needs attention. His children need even more. Mitch has avoided most of those pressures. He pursues women, takes occasional acting jobs, and seems to live without anyone relying on him. Each sees only the attractive parts of the other's life. After a night drinking together, they urinate in a fountain while wishing they could swap places. The next morning they discover they literally have. Dave is trapped inside Mitch's body. Mitch is trapped inside Dave's. At first, the switch seems like an opportunity. Then reality arrives. Dave discovers Mitch's supposedly carefree existence isn't quite as satisfying as it appeared. Mitch discovers that being a husband, father, and lawyer requires far more than showing up in Dave's body. With no immediate way to reverse the change, both men have to keep the other's life running while searching for the fountain that caused the switch.
The Movie Trailer
The Change-Up is an adult body-swap comedy about two lifelong friends who have spent years believing the other man has somehow ended up with the better life.
Dave Lockwood appears to have done everything correctly.
He's a successful lawyer, married to Jamie and raising a family.
His best friend Mitch lives almost the complete opposite existence.
Mitch is single, irresponsible and free from the obligations that dominate Dave's life.
Dave envies Mitch's freedom.
Mitch envies Dave's success and stability.
After a drunken night together, both men admit they'd rather have the other's life.
Then they wake up the next morning.
And discover somebody apparently listened.
THE SWITCH
They Asked for Each Other's Lives — Now They're Stuck With Them
Dave and Mitch don't simply envy each other.
They envy edited versions of each other's lives.
Dave sees freedom without seeing loneliness or uncertainty.
Mitch sees family and success without seeing the exhausting responsibility required to maintain them.
The body swap removes that distance.
Suddenly neither man can judge the other's life from the outside.
He has to live it.
DAVE
Freedom Looks Different When Nobody Is Waiting for You
Dave initially imagines Mitch's existence as everything adulthood took away from him.
No children waking him.
No marriage demanding attention.
No professional identity constantly at risk.
But freedom without responsibility doesn't automatically produce meaning.
Living Mitch's life forces Dave to confront what he misses and what he's stopped appreciating.
MITCH
Responsibility Might Be Exactly What He's Been Avoiding
Mitch enters Dave's life with almost none of the skills necessary to maintain it.
Suddenly, people depend on him.
Choices matter.
Failure affects somebody besides himself.
What begins as an impossible inconvenience gradually becomes exposure to something Mitch has spent years avoiding:
Growing up.
The joke behind The Change-Up is obvious.
Its more useful idea is that envy becomes considerably harder once you inherit the entire life rather than just the bits that looked good from across the room.