Time to change things up

Last August, Jason Bateman was in a movie called The Switch. This August, he's in a movie called The Change-Up.

Jason, how much harder must the cinematic universe work to tell you it's time to take a new path?

Let me start by saying I'm a huge Jason Bateman fan. In fact, I bet I've liked him a lot longer than you have. That is, unless you were also obsessed with the show It's Your Move, which ran on TV from 1984-1985 and co-starred Norman Lear. It was the sitcom Bateman was given after his funny supporting gig on Silver Spoons earned him buzz, and it way predates The Hogan Family.

So I was as happy as anyone to see him return to prominence, after a decade basically out of the spotlight, in Arrested Development. Since then, he's parlayed his Arrested success into a smart and fun movie career, particularly in such films as Juno and Extract.

However, lately it's starting to seem like Jason Bateman is beginning to wear out his welcome again. It's not that the profile of his work has diminished -- he still seems pretty bankable as a likable comic underdog. It's that he's gotten ... dare I say it? Lazy.

The comedies are sort of starting to come off the assembly line for Bateman: Couples Retreat. The Switch. Horrible Bosses. And now The Change-Up.

Like most phenomena I try to describe on this blog, it's more of a feeling I get than something I can absolutely prove -- a sense of a downward trend, like the type people in the stock market try to predict in order to avoid losing their life savings. Because those movies are not all bad. In fact, I can't say for sure that any of them are bad. Couples Retreat is okay, The Switch was pretty likable, and I haven't seen either of his 2011 releases, in part because The Change-Up is only just coming out today. (He was also in Paul this year, but that doesn't seem to fit the trend as much. You can include it if you're so inclined.)

Really, I don't know what I'm expecting from him. If I'm expecting him to pick up a job as a strung-out heroin addict, I may be deluding myself. It's not a knock against him, but he may not be capable of that, nor should he worry about it if he isn't. That kind of thing is not for everybody.

But I do remember thinking that the essentially comedic role in Juno was all the more memorable because it also showcased a certain melancholy, which Bateman hadn't previously proven he could generate. Jason Reitman had him back for his next movie, but Bateman's role in Up in the Air was essentially a cameo.

So I guess you could say I'm really just stuck on the Bateman I saw in Juno -- a guy who could sniff out a smart indie property with which to involve himself. Even though that was there in Extract, when you come right down to it, Extract only works in fits and starts anyway. The best part of Extract is actually Ben Affleck. (For the record, The Switch also contains Bateman in a more pensive mode.)

So maybe it's just his latest choice itself that's bothering me. A high-concept comedy in which his domesticated father of two switches bodies with a swinging bachelor type (Ryan Reynolds)? Haven't we seen this or something like it a hundred times before?

Then again, all I can really do is speculate. Making absolute pronouncements gets me in trouble. When I gave Seth Gordon a hard time for making Horrible Bosses, because I considered it beneath him as a one-time documentarian, you guys let me know that my perspective was short-sighted. And it looks like it was. After all, I've heard that some people really love Horrible Bosses -- people I respect.

Which just so happens to have been Bateman's last movie.

So what's Bateman's next movie? IMDB is cagey on the topic, though it lists the much-anticipated and long-awaited Arrested Development movie in 2012. However, as recently as a couple weeks ago, Will Arnett confirmed that the script was still in the writing stages. Which doesn't necessarily mean it won't come out in 2012, just that we should be wary -- we've heard this one before.

In between now and then, let's hope Bateman gets the hint and makes The Course Correction and The Smart Choice, instead of The Swap or The Do-Over or The Repeat or The Redundant.

The titles that didn't stand a chance

Two movies are coming out today that once had different titles -- either working titles, or actual titles that were being used in the original country of origin.

Neither title stood a chance. At least, not here in the U.S.

The first -- um, because I'm choosing to discuss it first -- is The Baster. Never heard of The Baster? That's because the title was switched (ha ha) to The Switch. The movie has been getting a decent amount of advertising play. And here's one Jennifer Aniston movie that might actually work. Doesn't Jason Bateman make anything he's in better? A blending of Aniston's usual audiences and Bateman's usual audiences could actually make this thing a hit.

But it could never have been with that original title.

When I first heard that Jennifer Aniston was working on a movie about artificial insemination called The Baster, I groaned. Yep, that's a baster as in a turkey baster. As in something you might jam up your coochie in order to impregnate yourself with the semen of a man (not present).

This image of Aniston and this title wouldn't have worked for a number of reasons:

1) It's just gross, in general;

2) It's gross specifically for Aniston, who is our girl next door -- lovable, sweet, and untainted by turkey basters working overtime;

3) It's sad specifically for Aniston, who has had such trouble finding a man she really likes, and might actually have to resort to the equivalent of jamming a turkey baster up her coochie if she ever wants to have a child;

4) The word "baster" itself is gross -- it shares too many letters in common with "masturbate," and it just feels kind of dirty to say.

So yeah, they were never actually going to use that title. I'm surprised they even show the part in the ad where Juliette Lewis playfully slaps Bateman's face and cheeks with the baster in question.

The second movie I'm going to discuss today is Nanny McPhee & The Big Bang. Haven't heard of Nanny McPhee & The Big Bang? That's because in the United States (and Canada), it's been neutered down to the more generic Nanny McPhee Returns.

And I have to think that has to do either with the stupidity of Americans or the prejudices of Americans.

I don't really know what the second Nanny McPhee movie is about, but I have to assume that its British title illuminates some essential part of the plot. But probably not something so essential that the words The Big Bang can't be excised from the title.

And why on earth would you need/want to do that?

Let's start with the less controversial of the two perspectives:

1) American audiences are dumb. Extra words in titles confuse us. Plus, there's a bit of a disconnect in this particular title. We know the original Nanny McPhee was about a warty and hook-nosed nanny who uses magic to shape up a brood of unruly kids, and that this probably took place sometime in the late 19th century or early 20th century. So what does that have to do with the theory of how the universe began? Either it's way too early (the big bang theory didn't come into existence as such until after World War II) or way too late (the actual big bang is supposed to have occurred "billyuns and billyuns of years ago," to quote Carl Sagan -- about 13.9 billion years ago, to be more precise).

2) American audiences are religious and prejudiced against any modes of thought that go against their religion. Given the great debates that go on this country between teaching evolution and teaching creationism, the distributors of Nanny McPhee & The Big Bang could not be blamed for realizing that their movie title contained a hot-button phrase that was likely to turn away "millyuns and millyuns" of viewers. Religious righters no sooner acknowledge the big bang theory than they acknowledge married gay people or Mexican immigrants. In fact, according to many of them, the earth is literally 6,000 years old. (Wrap your head around that for a moment.) Not wanting to shoot their potential box office in the foot, the distributors gave us the simpler and less controversial Nanny McPhee Returns.

I just recently saw the original Nanny McPhee and absolutely adored it. Early word is that this one is just as good, and that a third movie is already planned. News of the World, a British tabloid, apparently encouraged them to "roll on with Nanny McThree."

And if they can keep that clever title, I'll be really impressed.