It's a Boy Girl Thing (Movie Review)

The film opens by introducing us to next-door neighbors and high school seniors Nell Bedworth (Samaire Armstrong) and Woody Deane (Kevin Zegers). Nell is a straight-A student, overachiever, and teacher's pet who dreams of attending Yale. Woody is a slacker and underachiever who cares more about lacrosse and hanging out with his friends than academics. We see glimpses of their home lives - Nell has busy, career-focused parents who are often absent, while Woody lives with his laidback single dad.

Jakob Owens

An early scene shows Nell and Woody angrily confronting each other on their way to school one morning when Woody's lacrosse friends drive by and dump a milkshake on Nell as a prank. This kicks off an escalating feud between the two neighbors. At school, Nell gets back at Woody by messing with the scoreboard during his lacrosse game. Woody then sneaks into the girls' locker room to steal Nell's clothes while she's in the shower.

The feud comes to a head when Nell and Woody both make wishes about each other using an ancient Mayan statue on display at the natural history museum where Nell's mother works. They both wish that the other could see what it's like to walk in their shoes. The next morning, they wake up shocked to discover that their consciousnesses have switched bodies! Nell is horrified to be trapped in Woody's body while he gleefully checks out his temporary feminine assets.

What follows is a humorous, madcap adventure as Nell and Woody attempt to navigate a day at school while inhabiting each other's bodies and lives. Woody struggles to emulate Nell's studious, teacher's pet persona in her advanced classes while Nell tries to lead Woody's lacrosse team to victory in an upcoming game. Along the way, they start to gain appreciation for each other's lives and develop an unexpected attraction.

The body swap leads to some comical scenarios as Nell/Woody has to contend with male urges in the locker room and gets sent to detention for uncharacteristic bad behavior in class while Woody/Nell inappropriate flirts with boys and struggles to avoid saying or doing anything to compromise her spotless reputation.

A standout sequence occurs when Woody goes on a date with his own body inhabited by Nell. He orders exotic Ethiopian food to try to gross himself/Nell out but she manages to gracefully adapt to the unfamiliar meal. Later at Woody's house, his dad catches them kissing which is wildly uncomfortable for poor Nell stuck inside Woody.

As the film hurtles towards the lacrosse championship, the stakes heighten around whether Nell and Woody can pull off successfully performing as each other. A time crunch also heightens around breaking the body swap curse by returning the Mayan statue by midnight to the museum.

On the climactic day, Nell/Woody's odd leadership of the team throws off his friends while Woody/Nell's uncharacteristic stumbling in a major academic contest threatens her Yale scholarship chances. Meanwhile the statue remains in their possession as the clock ticks down towards their potential permanent body swap.

The film culminates in a mad dash to the museum and lacrosse game with the fates of their body swap, lacrosse championship, and academic futures all intertwined and hanging in the balance. The conclusion offers a creative resolution to the body swap as Nell and Woody ultimately appreciate walking in each other's shoes, reach new mutual understanding, and hint at an unexpected romance blossoming.

For teenage viewers, the movie taps insightfully into universally relatable feelings of not understanding the opposite sex, along with the social pressures of high school life defining one's identity. The body swap forces Nell and Woody to walk that mile in the other shoe, gaining empathy and nuance.

Certainly, the R rated elements and humor means this film skews toward more mature teen audiences. Yet the story's ultimate messages around embracing your own uniqueness and not letting peer labels define you remain widely relevant.