The defence The Popcorn Loyalist
“It owes the canon nothing.”
The movie pursues immediacy and audience pleasure without begging institutions to certify its worth.
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Switching Channels
Comedy · 1988
A television news chief courts his anchorwoman ex-wife with an eleventh-hour story.
Movie details
Switching Channels
“There's a lot more going on around here than news, weather, and sports.”
1988 Comedy 1h 45m
Critical arithmetic
The consensus, allegedly.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
IMDb
5.9 / 10
4.2K votes
Rotten Tomatoes
60 %
Tomatometer
TMDB
6.1 / 10
Community rating
External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.
A television news chief courts his anchorwoman ex-wife with an eleventh-hour story.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over Switching Channels?
For the defence
The Popcorn Loyalist
“Big screen, big feelings, no apologies.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Big-Idea Head
“You watch with your brain, not your gut.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
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Chris Rock: Tamborine
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Where it lives
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Streaming availability data supplied by JustWatch.
Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
Ted Kotcheff
Written by
Ben Hecht · Charles MacArthur · Jonathan Reynolds
Kathleen Turner
Christy Colleran
Burt Reynolds
John L. Sullivan IV
Christopher Reeve
Blaine Bingham
Ned Beatty
Roy Ridnitz
Henry Gibson
Ike Roscoe
George Newbern
Siegenthaler
Al Waxman
Berger
Court is in session
Put Switching Channels on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Big-Idea Head
“Easy pleasure, short half-life.”
It moves efficiently through the moment but offers little reason to keep arguing once the credits end.