Review of Swingers (2009) by Kyle L — 05 Mar 2010

For me, Swingers is the ultimate guy flick, in the same way that maybe Pretty Woman or Dirty Dancing is, for some girls, the ultimate chick flick. It's a feel good movie, the characters are all people you'll probably recognize as having met somewhere along the line yourself, and the situation, a guy trying to come to terms with getting dumped by the girl he loves is something most of us have been through at some point.

The story itself is a simple one, Mike (John Faverau) moves out to California to try to make a career for himself as a stand up comedian only to find out his girlfriend is breaking up with him. He struggles with this, simply can't get his head around life without her and becomes more and more miserable. His buddies are a bunch of lounge club, wannabe actors and are all determined to snap him out of it. They rally round him, taking him out, trying to force him to meet other women and teach him their pick up secrets; generally making total fools of themselves in the process but all in the name of friendship.

At times its laugh out loud funny with some of the best one liners I can think of and hilarious situations that we've all been through. But its also got far more than just laughs to it, its got a real heart and a message about moving on with your life because you never know what's round the corner, its about how guys deal with stuff and its about the genius friendship process that is male bonding.

A young Heather Graham stars and turns out to be the girl that proves to Mike that there actually be another woman out there that can make him forget about his ex. It's really the movie that really introduced Vince Vaughan however and he gives a brilliant performance as Trent, Mike's best friend. Suffering from the biggest overdose of over-confidence ever, he goes round forcing people to like him with his non-stop banter and big, in your face personality, a man who just doesn't take no for an answer. Trent is very much the cheery, confident Ying to Mike's depressed and needy Yang and they compliment each other perfectly.

Swingers boasts a great soundtrack as well that's almost the icing on the cake on what, for me, remains one of my favorite 90's movies. If you haven't seen it, I urge you to check it out, its looking a bit dated now but that shouldn't stop anyone having a good time with it and hopefully making you smile.