A minor automobile collision between Gavin Banek (Ben Affleck) and Doyle Gibson (Samuel L. Jackson) on New York City's busy F.D.R. Drive, first causes problems in their plans for the morning and later gives them an opportunity to transform their very flawed personal lives.

Gavin is a newly appointed law partner in a large firm and is married to the boss's daughter. He is also having an affair with Michelle (Toni Collette), another lawyer in the firm. He epitomizes the worst in lawyers who are slick, high paid, clean on the surface but scratch it

and you find dirt. Doyle is a recovering alcoholic whose wife Valerie (Kim Staunton) is about to move from NYC to Oregon with their two young sons; he wants so badly to be a good father.

After the minor fender bender, Gavin takes off without getting Doyle's name. He just gives him a personal check, left blank, to repair the damage and leaves. This was my first real problem with the film, as the story should have come across as being realistic. There is no way on this earth that you give a stranger in New York City a blank check for something that clearly is less than a $1,000 worth of damage.

Gavin leaves the scene so quickly he does not realize that he has left the briefcase with the documents he will soon need in court. He won't even give the stranded Doyle a ride to court, which results in him losing custody of his children. However, Doyle now has the documents Gavin needs, which he refuses to relinquish. He is forced to change his mind after manipulation by Gavin results in Doyle becoming bankrupt, according to the computer that the bank loan officer uses. This glitch will stop Doyle from closing on a house the next day so he can keep his kids from moving to Oregon.

As the story unfolds, Gavin and Doyle take one another on to get what each wants. For Gavin that's the file he needs to win his case and for Doyle it's to have his credit cleared so he can buy his house. Their battle leads to a predictable positive ending for both, but in a way that is a real twist for Gavin.

Doyle's view of life is that "I am champagne," which for a person in AA, is a dangerous analogy. In fact, he is addicted to chaos more than alcohol. This highlights one of the better parts of the film, Doyle's relationship with his wife Kim Staunton, who turns in a performance that is surprisingly a notch higher than the fine work done by Affleck and Jackson. Another revealing scene is the conversation of "how to play the game" between Gavin and his wife, played by Amanda Peet, who will do whatever it takes to maintain her lifestyle.

Where the film falls down big time is the long list of things that just would not be said and coincidences that even with the theory of six degrees of separation stretch believability beyond what makes a good movie. The non-believability clause runs long in "Changing Lanes" and a few examples are when Gavin drives around looking for Doyle and sees him right away¾in NYC. Gavin has another auto accident later in the day and when he starts walking, he's at the same location of the accident with Doyle. An intern is waiting in Gavin's office for an interview after the office has long been closed and the lights turned out. Gavin has a three-day beard by 5 PM to make him look like he's mentally distraught. And then there's a laughable conversation between Gavin and a priest in a confessional because there are no seats left in the church.

In this case it also demonstrates how a movie can be made in such a cavalier fashion that even with solid acting, a decent story, slickly told and with high production values, the more you see of the film, the less you like it. We will give this the left-hand compliment of saying that it's one of the better movies worth waiting to see when it comes out on video. We just didn't like the film as much as we wanted to.