Review: 17 Again
So, 17 Again. More-or-less your basic body-swap tale, with the slight difference being that we start out with the younger version of the character, Mike O’Donnell (played by Zac Efron), who gives up his college hoops future to stick with his pregnant girlfriend (although the film is never clear on why he couldn’t both stick with her AND pursue his dreams, as more than one college athlete has done successfully).
We flash-forward to 20 years later, where Mike (now played by Matthew Perry) is a miserable schlub who’s spent probably most of the previous two decades blaming his wife and kids for his failure to do anything inspiring, or even to see things through to the finish at all. After an encounter with Brian Doyle-Murray as a magical janitor (hey, at least this time the filmmakers didn’t take the route of it being a magical minority), Mike finds himself back into his 17-year-old body (played by Efron again). The twist here is that he’s not switching places with his own teenage son, or traveling back in time to rectify what he sees as his past mistakes; he’s 17 again, but in the present day, with his adult wife and teenage children still there.
Sci-fi buffs might take issue with this, as logically (well, in the realm of sci-fi logic anyhow), if Mike reverted back to his 17-year-old self in the present day, would that not obliterate the time line where his now-teenage children exist? And what of Mike’s parents? And wouldn’t his long-term best friendship with the dorktastic Ned (Thomas Lennon, best known to Reno 911! fans as Lt. Dangle) have also been obliterated along with the previously existing time line? But let’s assume that we’re willing to suspend our collective disbelief around the vagaries of alternative-time line scenarios, and go with what we have.
This opens the door to all kinds of awkward/creepy scenarios in which the newly younger Mike/Mark gets to bond with his teenage offspring through a different persona, coach his picked-on son (Sterling Knight, who’s very good in this film) into popularity and a date with the head cheerleader he has a crush on via basketball skills, counsel his daughter (Michelle Tractenberg, who’s always good but also needs to be reaching for more challenging roles at this point) about her relationship with the controlling jerk/basketball star she’s dating, and interact with his soon-to-be ex wife as a different person, which allows him to see her — and himself — in a different light. Of course, it’s inevitable that his own daughter will develop a crush on him (ewww) and that he will be attracted to his wife, even though he now looks 17 (ewww again), but the film mostly handles those issues tactfully.
Zac Efron is a talented guy, no doubt about it. He’s got the movie star charm, and he mostly carries this mediocre film to a bit above the level it otherwise would have been. But I liked him better in Hairspray, and even in the first High School Musical film, and I’d really like to see him stretch his wings a bit beyond what he’s doing right now. Or at least, I’d like to see him take on the occasional dramatically challenging arthouse film in between the commercial schlock, because I do think he actually has the talent in there to do more, and we see glimmers of it here that never quite ignite.
As for Matthew Perry, while I do believe he has way more talent in there than we’ve seen from him, and has the potential to do the comedic-actor-who’s-actually-better-playing-serious route ala Bill Murray and even Steve Martin, he’s just not picking the right scripts to get him there (see also: Birds of America). This film doesn’t give him enough room for us to really care at all about the older Mike at all, and if Perry’s ever going to break out in his post-Friends career, he’s got to find the right script to be taken seriously, as Jennifer Aniston did with The Good Girl (still her best post-Friends work, although I did very much like her in Marley & Me).
Lennon almost steals the show, particularly once agrees to be his BFF’s “dad” and enrolls the new, younger Mike (who’s now renamed himself “Mark”) back in the same high school he attended 20 years previously; this opens the door for Ned to fall head-over-heels for the uptight principal (Melora Hardin) and pursue her in all kinds of socially inappropriate ways. I laughed almost every time Lennon was on-screen, but then again I love Reno 911! and have an admitted soft spot for guys who wear attachable elf ears and speak Elvish fluently.
My one issue with the film (particularly given the teen audience it’s targeted at) is the way a trio of slutty high school girls throw themselves at “Mark,” even trying to one-up each other in sluttiness (“You don’t even have to remember my name!”). Ugh. Does the filmmaker or the studio really feel they need to be sending this kind of message about teenage sexual behavior to its target audience as though young girls offering their bodies to a hot guy is funny, or even okay? It’s certainly not the message I want my 12-year-old getting when she goes to see a film starring her favorite Disney-marketed star.
Other than that, though, I didn’t have any major problems with 17 Again. It’s certainly not high art, but I laughed quite a lot. This is mostly harmless movie fun aimed at the younger set; nothing to write home about, but for the most part, a fun film to kill a couple hours with.
Re: the triumvirate of horizontal ease – Seeing as how these three girls aren’t the only girls in the film, nor are they even the starring girls, I don’t know that the movie is actually sending the message you worry that it is; and if it were, I’m not sure that it would be all that an attractive one anyway.
Do they capture Efron’s heart with their whoring? Does he take one of them and run off for parts unknown, leaving his wife and kids behind forever? Do their chastity allergies gain them anything at all here? If any of these questions are answered “yes”, that would be sad, but hardly upsetting since it’s Trachtenberg’s character who I assume is holding up the positive image of young women in the film.
I’d be more concerned that the trio’s behavior was being portrayed in a ridiculous and phony Hollywood movie kind of way instead of better resembling their counterparts in real life.
Hallick,
Actually, what saves that scene is that Efron’s character looks at them, shakes his head and mutters, “This is some other parent’s problem” and walks off. Which ends up making it funny. Kind of how Brandi’s line in the “date rape” scene in Observe and Report is supposed to make that scene funny, only it actually works here.
And yes, Trachtenberg’s character is the one I’d say most girls will identify with more, and she’s a virgin who loses the asshole guy because she won’t go all the way with him, which I kind of liked.
And actually, Hallick, forgot to add this, but you say “I’d be more concerned that the trio’s behavior was being portrayed in a ridiculous and phony Hollywood movie kind of way instead of better resembling their counterparts in real life.”
I’m guessing you haven’t been around a lot of real-life high school girls lately, because I’d say that trio is more common that Trachtenberg’s virgin.
FWIW, Efron has had Richard Linklater’s “Me and Orson Welles” in the can for about a year now. Don’t know when or if it’s gonna get released, but at least it seems to be that step in the right direction you’re advocating.
As for Matthew Perry — I seriously doubt he turned down any Oscar-potential roles to do this film. I, too, get frustrated when talented actors take on iffy projects, but I don’t blame them much unless they’re Nicolas Cage. Perry’s box office potential peaked with “The Whole Nine Yards,” and full-fledged movie stardom hasn’t happened for him. I imagine he got cast in “17 Again” because he didn’t have to carry the film, and no bankable star would take such a secondary role. I’m sure Perry doesn’t have to work, thanks to his “Friends” money, but if he WANTS to work on the big screen, he probably doesn’t have a wide range of projects from which to choose.
I’ve been around my share of high school girls, and I don’t doubt that there are slutty groups among them. I wasn’t saying that portraying some high school girls as sluts was ridiculous and phony in itself because, golly gee willickers Beave, teenagers aren’t like THAT. I was just wondering if the sluttiness was so patently unreal that there wouldn’t be a chance in hell that a girl in the audience could come away thinking, “hey now THAT looks like a successful lifestyle!”.
TRACHTEN-HOTNESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
SO. HOT. Great picture. She is pure ownage and should do a remake of Thelma and Louise with Amy Smart where they go to motels and paint each other’s nails and hop around on the bed singing into hairbrushes and shit.
GOOD IDEA.
TRACHTENBERG IS GOD.