Changing Lanes

A woman sitting near me during Changing Lanes would not shut up. At every plot twist, she would murmur, "Uh-oh!" She laughed inexplicably throughout, though no one else in the theater found anything remotely amusing in the action onscreen. And with every screamed shout of indignation by the characters, she would cry out in agreement: "Yeah!!" No matter how people asked her to quiet herself, she kept it up, all the way until the credits. As I walked out, I overheard the couple sitting in front of me openly voicing their wish to throttle the annoying patron. I mean, they were pissed.


It's more than mildly ironic that such an encounter would occur during a screening of Changing Lanes, because the film's main focus is our implied "social contract" -- the unspoken agreement between us all that says we won't be rude or mean (or loud in the movie theater) and that we'll always try to help if we can. If one person violates that contract, dire consequences are likely to follow. The trailers have done this film a great disservice -- trailers seem to depict it as a hot-blooded, suspense-filled human chess match, ala Panic Room, but it's actually nothing of the kind. It's still not any good, mind you, not by any means, but it's not as shallow as the advertisements seem determined to make it out to be. It is, however, just as boring and preachy as you think it is.

The concept here is actually pretty good, and man oh man, Changing Lanes can't wait to get there. Our main characters are introduced very simply, cutting back-and-forth between them every twenty seconds or so for about five minutes. We get the basics, but nothing of consequence. Ben Affleck is Gavin Banek, your typical Big Shot Lawyer who cruises around in his fancy car, cheating on his wife (Amanda Peet) with his secretary (Toni Collette). He's about to seal the deal on a huge case that will make his firm millions -- he just needs to deliver some very important documents to the courthouse. Meanwhile, across town, we find Samuel L. Jackson as Doyle Gibson, your typical Estranged But Loving Father, putting the finishing touches on a loan so he can buy his ex-wife a house in a last-ditch attempt to keep his children near him. Oh, and he's a recovering alcoholic, too, for no good reason other than to give William Hurt something to do as his AA sponsor. Doyle is going to unveil the new house at his custody hearing -- this morning at the courthouse. All of the above (and more) is covered in about four minutes, with the action swinging back and forth, crosscutting between the two of them. It's almost dizzying, and not in a good way.

But fate strikes: as both are headed to the courtroom, Gavin and Doyle are involved in some kind of car accident on the FDR. I wish I could tell you what happened, but I'm not entirely sure myself -- this scene, like much of the film, is edited in such a shoddy, pedestrian manner that it's impossible to discern the events. Gavin's car is just scratched up, but Doyle's is disabled. In a hurry to get to court, Gavin leaves Doyle stranded, without even given him an insurance card. He does, however, leave something more important -- the crucial file he was on his to court to deliver is dropped on the road. Doyle picks it up, and heads on his way, only to show up too late to make a difference at his custody hearing. When Gavin shows up sans file in the courtroom, he's given until the end of the day to find it. And so it begins.

From there, Changing Lanes always feels like it's just getting ready to take off. Every beat of the film seems to contain a masterpiece just waiting to get out, but it never gets around to doing it. Lying in the cold, wet murk of this film is a classic somewhere, but director Roger Mitchell (the auteur behind Notting Hill...yuck) doesn't know how to find it. He seems to have an almost fetishistic obsession with glass -- what felt like fifty percent of the film is shot through glass, be it windows, windshields, or glass doors. All of the offices in Gavin's law building are built from glass, and many scenes within them are photographed from the outside. Why? No reason I can discern. Add this to the choppy, Bruckheimer-like editing, and Changing Lanes becomes a very hard film to sit through. Half of your time is spent just trying to figure out what's going on.

The script is at turns both compelling and frustrating. One very notable aspect is its refusal to call sides -- neither Gavin nor Doyle are the "bad guys" here. Each resorts to hideous (and illegal) tactics to get at the other, so much so that the point of all this is lost (to them, not the audience) beneath macho posturing and "How do you like that, motherfucker!" showdowns. They alternate roles as the film progresses: one will be sad and regretful of the events, the other pissed as hell and working for vengeance. The first will decide to end it and call a truce, but just before they get a chance, the other's next heinous plan will enact, and the two will switch sides for the next fifteen minutes. It quickly becomes obvious and predictable. And this is all before the film commits its major sin in the final act: I hoped, somewhere in the back of my mind, that Mitchell or the screenwriters would have the guts to steer this movie into truly reproachful territory, driving the point home with a shocking climax; I was disappointed. The finish is the safe way to go, never mind the fact that it's completely preposterous, even compared to the rest of the film.

If there's anything in this film to give high praise to, it's the cast. I'm a big fan of both Jackson and Affleck, and they are stellar here. Both Gavin and Doyle go through lots of emotional turmoil, and the two actors (Jackson especially) give excellent performances. Dylan Baker only appears in two scenes as one of those Hollywood "guys who knows how to make people do things they don't want to do" (who wields "computer voodoo"), but he's instantly memorable -- the unrestrained glee he exudes while destroying someone's life made me shudder.

All in all, I can't say that I really hated Changing Lanes, but I can say I was sorely let down. The film's message is a good one, even if it is handed down a little heavy. I'm going to go ahead and give it my standard "Maybe you'll like this more than I did" score, and I mean it -- this movie deserves a lot of credit for not being what I was afraid it would be...even if it's not much of anything else.

Rating: **