13 Going On 30 - Review

Have you ever had those certain people in your life that you don't get to see often, but when you do, and they want to watch a movie, the movie of choice always seems to be the same one. For my female cousins who are 3 and 6 years older than me, 13 Going On 30 was that movie. So it's safe to say that I watched this movie a ton when I was a kid. And although I was only 9 when this movie came out and I my idea of fun at the time was catching Pokemon on my gameboy rather than talking to girls, I really enjoyed this movie back then, and I really enjoy this movie now. This is one of those "body-swap" movies. You know the movies I'm talking about right? Where a kid appears in an adults body or vice versa? And like Tom Hanks in Big and Jamie Lee Curtis in Freaky Friday and even Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, Jennifer Garner does a great job of playing a 13 year old girl in a 30 year old's body. She gets super excited to find out that she has boobs now, she still loves to dance to 80's music and have slumber parties, and even gets grossed out when her NHL boyfriend tries to have sex with her. Garner is extremely likeable and fun and she warrants many laughs. This writing team also brought us "What Women Want" with Mel Gibson a couple years earlier and you can tell that these writers know how to write the business atmosphere into comedy really well. While Jennifer Garner is the star of the movie and is extremely fun, Mark Ruffalo is great as the boy next door who has been in love with Jenna Rink since they were kids. He kind of reminds me of me in a way. Maybe that's why I like him. Judy Greer also plays a great office bitch lady and the actress they got to play her younger version is almost identical. Overall, this is a pretty standard "body-swap" rom com that is really elevated by Jennifer Garner's performance. Without her, this film doesn't work. Guys, if you're looking for a movie for date night, this is a pretty good one to go with.