Switch ** (1991, Ellen Barkin, Jimmy Smits, JoBeth Williams, Lorraine Bracco, Tony Roberts, Lysette Anthony, Bruce Payne) – Classic Movie Review 6928

Writer-director Blake Edwards’ s Switch (1991) stars an appealing Ellen Barkin, who scored a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical.

Barkin grabs hold of her chance to stretch her acting muscles and is outstanding in this gender switch, role reversal comedy about Steve Brooks (Perry King), a sexist womaniser who gets shot by one of his former lovers, goes to heaven and comes back reincarnated as Amanda Brooks (Barkin), a woman with a man’s mentality.

Edwards’ s uneasy, only occasionally funny, knockabout fantasy comedy reworks the story of George Axelrod’s play Goodbye Charlie, filmed in 1964 Tony Curtis, Debbie Reynolds, Pat Boone, and that was none too brilliant either. Edwards, with a bag of over-familiar tricks, does not have the success he achieved with his gender switch comedy Victor Victoria.

Ellen Barkin as Amanda Brooks in Switch.

Also in the cast are Jimmy Smits, JoBeth Williams, Lorraine Bracco, Tony Roberts, Lysette Anthony, Bruce Payne as The Devil,Victoria Mahoney, Basil Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Kevin Kilner and David Wohl.

Switch is directed by Blake Edwards, runs 113 minutes, is a Beco and HBO production, is released by Columbia Tri-Star, is written by Blake Edwards, is shot by Dick Bush, is produced by Tony Adams, is scored by Henry Mancini and is designed by Roger Maus.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 6928

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