For Valentine’s Day, Netflix released a new romantic comedy “To you or to me?”. Genre stars Reese Witherspoon and Ashton Kutcher played the main roles in it. How interesting the love story between their characters turned out to be – we tell you in the review below.

“To you or to me?” / Your Place or Mine

Genre romantic comedy
Director Aline Brosh McKenna
In roles Ashton Kutcher, Reese Witherspoon, Jess Williams, Tig Notaro, Steve Zahn
Premiere Netflix
Graduation year 2023
Site IMDb

Twenty years ago, hot-tempered Peter and Debbie slept together, but after that they did not work out as a couple. Young people managed to maintain a warm relationship and even became best friends. True, it was friendship, even without sex.

Today, Peter changes girls like gloves, lives in a luxurious apartment in New York and is afraid to take steps towards his happiness, both professional and personal. Debbie managed to have a family, but now she is raising a teenage son and lives in a modest but cute house in Los Angeles.

Despite the fact that the heroes are separated by a great distance, they communicate a lot with each other and seem to share secret dreams with each other. One day, Debbie plans to go to New York for a week to take courses important for her professional growth. But later she is forced to abandon the idea due to the fact that at the last moment the babysitter announces a change of plans.

Suddenly, Peter comes to help the unfortunate woman. The man offers his best friend to sit with the child while she listens to lectures and takes an exam. Thus, the best friends exchange housing (not bodies – and that’s fine) for a week, not knowing that this will turn their usual lives upside down.

“To you or to me?” – The directorial debut of experienced screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna. She wrote the scripts for “27 Weddings”, “The Devil Wears Prada” and “Good Morning”.

McKenna also acts as a screenwriter and already in the second scene skillfully fools the audience with a simple visual effect – a polyscreen. But in fact, this will be almost the only surprise of the film, because it is made according to all the canons of frivolous rom-coms, which were still commonplace in zero. The same Kutcher once built a career on such unpretentious content.

Before us is another story from the category of those where, in addition to the main characters, it is obvious that they should be together. But for some reason, often implausible and far-fetched, these fools can’t cope with their long-suffering relationships. So the local characters waited twenty years to finally come to their senses.

With varying degrees of success, other elements characteristic of the genre will appear in the plot. For example, obstacles in the form of new romantic passions, characters-friends, too secondary to have any significant impact on the plot, or banal pop songs.

In many ways, the success of a romantic story depends on how good the chemistry between the main characters is. But the trouble “To you or to me?” in that Witherspoon and Kutcher’s characters are in different cities for almost the entire duration, so there is little time for general scenes.

Therefore, there can be no question of any emotional interaction, except that the actors alone must show themselves somehow. McKenna deliberately separates the lovers, sometimes literally, to clearly demonstrate their opposites.

Oddly enough, even in such unfavorable conditions, this rom-com, as a genre example, looks decent and sometimes cute. Watching Reese Witherspoon portray a book-loving, “legally blonde – 20 years later” sort of thing is a joy. And how Ashton Kutcher, who has lost a lot of weight (perhaps due to diagnosed vasculitis), tries to replace Ch̶a̶r̶l̶i̶ ̶Ш̶i̶n̶a̶ for a teenage father is also moderately interesting. What could be cooler than opening up to a young and overprotective boyfriend of “Alien” Ridley Scott, or giving some parenting advice?

By the way, Kutcher, who celebrated his 45th birthday on February 7 and, it seems, has not appeared in the main roles in a feature film since the flop “Jobs” (which is, for a moment, 10 years!), plays surprisingly restrained, without usual grimaces. Reese Witherspoon, on the contrary, gives her usual image of a beautiful blonde.

But among the secondary characters, only the glamorous heroine Zoe Chao is remembered. Jess Williams, star of the never-ending medical drama Anatomy of a Passion, plays the role of attractive furniture. All Tig Notaro does is put out his coffee all over the place. It’s better not to mention Steve Zahn’s ridiculous party at all.

“To you or to me?” notable also for the fact that it is a real consolation for viewers of conservative views. It is about an ordinary love between a white straight man and a white straight woman. For 2023, there is probably real boredom and idleness. But for the rest, the movie is cute enough to become a suitable addition to a pleasant romantic evening on Valentine’s Day.

Pros:
good actors, a bright “glossy” picture, several funny episodes, the general pleasant atmosphere of the film

Cons:
typical rom-com with no surprises and as a result too obvious predictability, minimal interaction between the main stars

Conclusion:

“To you or to me?” you can watch it on Valentine’s Day. The tape is also recommended for viewing to those viewers who missed romantic comedies of zeros