You’ve got to give Jennifer Aniston some credit; despite having a filmography with more stinkers than a baby’s nappy, she’s still not prepared to give up her precarious film ‘star’ status. It’s not clear how many piss poor films she has to appear in before she gets the fact that she’s just not leading lady material, but it doesn’t appear to be any time soon.

Someone should really be brave enough to tell her the truth though, because if her career was an ailing pooch, the kindest thing – for all of us – would have been to have it put down quite some time ago. If anything resembles that final, trembling yelp of pain before the need of the injection, it’s The Switch.

It’s only fitting that in these modern times, modern members of society resort to modern measures. Kassie (Aniston) and Wally (Jason Bateman) have been best friends for years. They both have affluent professions in the city that never sleeps, New York.

Kassie has reached that point in her life when the alarm from her body clock is ringing loud and clear. She wants to have a baby. Problem is, she’s not in a relationship. But being a modern gal, she knows that shouldn’t stop her from having a child. She decides that all she needs a man for is in the donation of his ‘seed’. Obviously using Wally’s would be just plain weird, so she finds a willing donor in Roland (Patrick Wilson).

Her flamboyant friend Debbie (Juliette Lewis) decides to throw Kassie a baby sperm shower party, where she can take the kind donation and find a new home for it. The good news is that Kassie does indeed fall pregnant; the bad news is however, that the sperm she does end up using, doesn’t belong to Roland.

Deciding that NYC is no place to raise a child, Kassie moves away and her relationship with Wally dwindles. Seven years later, she returns to the city, with her young son Sebastian (Thomas Robinson) in tow. Kassie and Wally pick up their relationship from where they left off, despite the fact that a small person now appears to be continually in the way.

The more time Wally spends with the unique Sebastian, the closer he gets to the realisation of what really happened seven years ago and his role in the whole event.

Oh my God, what have I done? Have I really just flushed my career down the pan? Damn you Aniston!!!

When a film promotes itself as being a rom-com, an audience is under the impression that there will be a fair sprinkling of romance and comedy taking place. Not so with The Switch. In fact, it is so devoid of both romance and humour that it should be done under the trades description act.

It’s a real shame as it has many of the right elements: Jason Bateman finally gets a shot at being the leading man and does a sterling job, considering the poor script he had to work with; it’s also great to see Jeff Goldblum back in the best buddy role, as is Juliette Lewis for Aniston’s character, although it’s difficult to believe that she’s just a few years shy of being forty.

Even the script is based on a short story by heavyweight author Jeffrey Eugenides (The Virgin Suicides, Middlesex); however, when you get the guys whose last film they directed was Blades of Glory on board, it’s a little like getting the Farrelly brothers to do Shakespeare. Clearly Josh Gordon and Will Speck were way out of their directing safety zone here, as the resulting film is an unparalleled mess from start to finish. Ill conceived? Most definitely.

What makes it worse is that there is no chemistry at all between Aniston and Bateman. It’s not clear whether Aniston has had plastic surgery or not; we hope she has for her sake, as at least it would be an understandable reason for her face being so free of any emotional expression.

Its one and only redeeming feature is a semi-touching scene between Bateman and the young Robinson; who thankfully falls into that category of child actors whose performance doesn’t send you into an automatic gag reflex.

At least the film company have done us all a massive favour; they’ve produced the kind of trailer for The Switch that condenses the entire pointless plot into it, which means that no one has to go and see it. At least some good came out of it.

And as far as Aniston’s career is concerned, the sooner she realises that TV is where she really belongs, the better – for all concerned.