Plot
Nine-year-old orphan Amanda Lemmon is being sought after by the Butkises, a reclusive and secretive family known to "collect" kids via adoption. However, she wants her likeable and warm-hearted social worker, Diane Barrows, to adopt her instead. Unfortunately for Amanda, authorities will not let Diane adopt Amanda due to the former's low salary, unmarried status, and social worker position, despite her interest in doing so.
While at a summer camp, Amanda meets a rich nine-year-old girl named Alyssa Callaway who looks just like her. Alyssa has just come home from boarding school, only to find that her wealthy widowed father and the camp's owner, Roger, is about to marry an overbearing, self-centered, gold-digging socialite named Clarice Kensington the following month.
Amanda and Alyssa soon become acquainted, each longing for the other's life and decide to switch places. While Amanda adapts to Alyssa's wealthy lifestyle and Alyssa experiences summer camp, they get to know the other's parental figure and realize that Roger and Diane would be perfect for each other. Desperate to set them up, the girls arrange many meetings between them, hoping that they will fall in love.
Roger and Diane seem to hit it off upon meeting, as she is pleasantly surprised with his kindness and humbleness despite his wealth, and Roger, with Diane's help, works up the courage to revisit the camp, which he has not done since his wife (Alyssa's mother) died due to painful memories of her untimely death when Alyssa was born.
After seeing Roger and Diane laughing and swimming together in the lake one afternoon, Clarice manipulates Roger into moving the wedding from the following month to the next day, and Amanda, while posing as Alyssa, discovers that Clarice plans on sending Alyssa to boarding school in Tibet afterwards. Alyssa then ends up being adopted by the Butkises without Diane's knowledge while posing as Amanda.
A few hours before the wedding, Amanda tells the Callaways' butler, Vincenzo, that she is not Alyssa. He visits Diane at the orphanage and informs her about the switch. Diane then goes to the Butkis residence to pick up the real Alyssa and get her to the wedding. However, nobody is there and one of the Butkises' neighbors tells Diane that the only reason why the Butkises adopted so many kids was to work them in their salvage yard as slaves. Enraged, Diane takes Roger's company helicopter to the salvage yard to reclaim Alyssa (disguised as Amanda) and threatens to report the Butkises to social services, giving their seven other adopted children hope for salvation.
Vincenzo and Amanda try their best to stall the wedding. As Roger hesitates to say, "I do", he remembers the good times he had with Diane and realizes that he has fallen in love with her and cannot marry Clarice. Suddenly, Diane bursts into the church with Alyssa behind her. At that moment, Roger confesses his love for Diane to Clarice, who furiously slaps him. Clarice tries to do the same to "Alyssa", blaming her for ruining the wedding, but is stopped by Vincenzo.
As Clarice storms down the aisle, the real Alyssa steps out from behind Diane. Clarice declares that there is a "conspiracy", thinking that there are two Alyssas. Clarice attempts to hit the real Alyssa but Diane steps forward in time, barking "Back off, Barbie" at Clarice, and calmly informs Clarice that she has something in her teeth. Humiliated, Clarice moves to storm out of the church again, but Alyssa deliberately steps on her wedding gown, causing it to rip off. This exposes Clarice's undergarments in front of all the wedding guests, even those with cameras, causing Clarice to desperately call for her father (who just laughs) and run away, trying to hide her undergarments from the flashing cameras.
An incredulous Roger learns that Alyssa has been with Diane while he had Amanda all this time, and they realize that the girls had orchestrated their meetups all along, about which they are extremely smug. After some encouragement from the girls, Roger and Diane share their first kiss and the four of them board a horse-drawn carriage, driven by Vincenzo, to take a ride through Central Park.
Reception
The film was released on November 17, 1995, in the United States and grossed $19.5 million, and made $75 million in home-video sales, making it Warner Home Video's fourth biggest seller in the family category. [5]
It received an 8% approval rating on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes, based on 24 reviews, with an average rating of 3.9/10. The site's consensus reads "Rob Base and DJ EZ Rock told us that It Takes Two to make a thing go right, but this unpleasant Olsen twins comedy proves that the opposite can also be true". [6] At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 with reviews from mainstream critics, the film received an average score of 45 based on 12 reviews, indicating "mixed or average" reviews. [7] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale. [8]
Kevin Thomas from Los Angeles Times called the film a predictable but fun romp. [9] Roger Ebert called it harmless and fitfully amusing with a numbingly predictable plot and praiseworthy performances, and rated it two out of four stars. [10]
The website Parent Previews graded the film an overall B as family-friendly, with "only a couple of bad words and a bit of child intimidation from the bad guys". Rod Gustafson from that website called it predictable with a happy ending that children can enjoy. [11]
