Netflix’s algorithm is so finely tuned that I never actually knew this movie was released, because they didn’t show it on my profile. If you looked at my girlfriend’s Netflix profile, you’d get a different story.
Apparently Netflix has been churning out the cheap, cheesy rom-coms for awhile now and I had no idea! Luckily, my girlfriend was aware of The Princess Switch and she watched it, which means I watched it, too.
There’s a very thin line between movies so bad they’re good, and… well, “chick-flicks.” Because these cheesy Hallmark movies really ARE bad, but just in a different intentional way. The Princess Switch is not different, and it starts the same way as all the others, too: immediately. Like every other cheesy film, our lead Stacy (Vanessa Hudgens) is an extremely successful small business owner of a bakery.
Her friend-zoned bestie and business partner Kevin enters them into a baking contest in the fictional country of Belgravia. This country has a princess by the name of Lady Margaret Delacourt (also Hudgens) and they literally run into each other.
They each hate the monotony of their incredibly successful and enchanting lives and, of course, decide to switch roles for a couple days even though Stacy knows fuck all about international politics and Lady Margaret Delacourt can’t even bake a far because FUCK IT, CHRISTMAS. Stacy falls for the Prince courting Lady Margaret, and Lady Margaret falls for Stacy’s bestie Kevin… which, of COURSE she would because just look at this dude:
Stacy claims she has not once ever thought of Hot Single Dad “in that way” which we all know is a crock of shit. Kevin’s daughter almost immediately figures out that the princess switch has happened, but loves it. Why? Because she gets to spend time with royalty, of a woman who looks EXACTLY LIKE HER DAD’S BOSS. Which brings up another point: NOBODY really reacts that two people, completely unrelated and separated by an ocean, look exactly like each other.
It’s hard to even hash out the “conflict” because these movies so rarely have any. Sometimes they have a million conflicts that all get wrapped up in literally the final 5 mins. This was somewhere in the middle. There was no “real” conflict, but they threw a bunch of “conflicts” at us anyway:
- Baking Rival Brianna is also in the competition
- Baking Rival Brianna also sabotages Stacy’s baking tools
- Lady Margaret is engaged to Prince Edward, who she doesn’t love, and never actually kissed or romanticized with?
- Royal Family hires private investigator because the exact DNA match for Lady Margaret acts slightly less ladylike.
- Hating one’s own established life.
Never fret, for all of these are solved within the last few minutes of the film which ends, of course, in a wedding, because almost all of them do. The two women go back to their “regular” lives, but fall for the other’s fella. In true cheesy-film, chick-flick fashion, our strong independent lead woman is incomplete until she finds a man. The End.
