Matthew Perry's Beloved Fantasy Movie Is A Netflix Gem You Shouldn't Miss

Certain movies follow a well-proven formula so strictly and diligently that you can practically call every single plot beat long before it happens. In general, this predictability can ruin every viewing experience, yet there are exceptions when it becomes a charm. Sometimes, there's a warm and appealing comfort to gain from watching exhausted tropes.

Burr Steers' 2009 comedy, "17 Again" (now streaming on Netflix), starring Matthew Perry and Zac Efron, is one of those cases. It's virtually a remix of every body-swap rom-com you've ever seen — essentially the male version of Jennifer Garner's beloved "13 Going on 30" in reverse — that leans so hard into all the clichés that they somehow become its virtue. Unless you were born in a cave and never left, you've heard this premise at least a dozen times: Mike O'Donnell (Perry) is a 37-year-old failure, right on the cusp of divorce from his high-school sweetheart Scarlet (Leslie Mann), whom he chose 20 years ago instead of embarking on a promising basketball career when she told him she was pregnant.

Since then, the two have had two kids, Alex (Sterling Knight) and Maggie (Michelle Trachtenberg), who are now teens, and Mike never let Scarlet live down that she's the one to blame for him missing out on a better life. Being bitter and resentful, it's all a wash for him now, and the circle becomes complete once he gets fired from the job he's been grinding at for 16 years. Only if he could do it all over again... Well, after encountering a magical janitor at his old school, Mike gets that chance as he turns into his 17-year-old self (Efron) after falling from a bridge trying to save the old bloke.

Reliving your youth with an adult brain, but in the same body you had in your teenage years, is an immortal fantasy we've all entertained at certain points in our lives. It never gets old, no matter how many movies you watch about it. "17 Again" isn't the greatest one — that title is reserved for Tom Hanks's '80s classic, "Big" — in fact, it's a sort of reimagined version of the 1986 TV film "Young Again," which starred a young Keanu Reeves before he made his best sci-fi movies.

Still, it's hard to argue that Steers' modernized version simply works in spite of its pedestrian premise filled with soothing Hollywood sweetness and silly one-bit humor. Even when the writing feels too generic and too formulaic, the terrific cast manages to elevate the material beyond mediocre. And while Perry is a perfect choice for the deadbeat husband, "17 Again" is really Efron's movie, proving that he's more than just a pretty face designed to steal every woman's heart (and that the "High School Musical" franchise was only a stepping stone to fame and greatness).

He's offensively handsome and chiseled but can also hold his own when it comes to farce. Yet he's not the best thing in "17 Again." The guy who shamelessly steals the show from under him and Perry is Thomas Lennon's Ned, the nerdy-geeky best friend of Mike, who delivers the biggest laughs with his fine-tuned slapstick moments and feigned confidence to seduce the school principal played by "The Office's" excellent Melora Hardin. Their exaggerated back-and-forth and courting tango is comedy paradise. It's the subplot that's so effortlessly good that it virtually overshadows the main story.

Make no mistake, this isn't a film that appeals to hardcore cinephiles and highbrow film bros. It's formulaic to a fault and has no intention of crossing any kind of boundaries (dramatic or comical), instead playing it as safe as possible. It's a funny movie that you can watch with the whole family designed for teenagers and their parents, casual moviegoers, and anybody who wants to turn his mind completely off after a hard day of work.

While many critics acknowledged its simple yet well-played strengths, a lot of them also dismissed it as a standard, unremarkable high school-comedy fare. To be fair, that's a pretty accurate assessment, which resulted in the mediocre-ish rating of 57% on Rotten Tomatoes. See, Steers' feature was never meant to be a critic's favorite. Its only goal was to attract the masses and entertain them for 90 minutes, hopefully putting a big smile on their faces when they left the theater. "17 Again" accomplished that mission and then some.

After hitting cinemas in 2009, the film managed to gross over $136 million worldwide at the box office against its relatively low $20-40 million budget. It was an undeniable hit that propelled Efron's career in the right direction, although it didn't do much for Perry, who went straight back to TV. 17 years later, it still works as a typical, innocuous aughts comedy that never tries to be more than what it is, but now with an added layer of nostalgia. If you never caught it before, it's the perfect time to gather your family and fire it up on Netflix for a shared laugh (or, ideally, a lot more).