Only minutes into 17 Again, I was already laughing at the colorful cast and comical situations.
17 Again first shows us Mike O'Donnell (Matthew Perry) as a middle-aged man working in pharmaceutical sales for a large company that doesn't appreciate him. He is a father of two, with a wife who is in the process of divorcing him because she is tired of him complaining about how his life turned out.
We then get to flash back in time to high-school Mike (Zac Efron) who has a promising basketball career until he throws it all away to take care of his high school girlfriend who he got pregnant and made his wife.
While walking through the hallways of his old high school, Mike has a run-in with the janitor and is given the option of going back in time to re-live his high school years. He takes it.
With the help of then and now best friend Ned Gold (Thomas Lennon), Mike enrolls at the high school he graduated from.
It is comical to see Zac Efron strolling through the hallways in his Ed Hardy gear only to see him acting and thinking like Matthew Perry. It is also hilarious to see the way Mike's soon-to-be ex-wife Scarlet O'Donnell (Leslie Mann) responds to the young Mike.
She plays with his face and tells her friend that he looks exactly like her husband in high school. The two of them continue to form a strange bond throughout the movie.
The turning point of the movie is when Mike realizes he is not here to change his career or himself but rather to help his kids, Alex (Sterling Knight) and Maggie (Michelle Trachtenberg).
He helps Alex get the confidence to play a key role on the basketball team and also, to get the girl. He also guides Maggie as she is treated poorly in a relationship with a bad guy and is there to support her when he dumps her for not putting out.
Just when Mike is getting his chance to make it big with his basketball career again, he runs after Scarlet and instantly turns back into the old Mike.
The movie is wholesome and leaves you feeling like you shouldn't regret or want to change the past but only move forward to create your future.
17 Again was fun, funny and relatable for people of all ages. While there were quite a few laughs during the movie, I may have seen a few tears in the theater at the end.
You can contact Kate Hollinger at kate.hollinger@gmail.com