not sure if this would help, but here are some thoughts:
- depending on the age and gaming experience of the players, and mostly their personalities, it might be very hard, or impossible to get them to switch their preferences. people like different things in games, and that's about it. in time people may learn to like other aspects of game, or be more open to other styles, but in general people tend to stick to their preferred style of play. my suggestion is to try to mix and match elements of the game to suit most moods. sometime it works, sometimes it doesn't.

- D&D can be played sort of narratively (is that a word?) but it requires one (or a combination of) the following: like minded players, specific setting, and specific game mechanics. the players however are by far the most important part i think. still, there are some setting with low magic, deeper and more complicated cultures plots and the like, and more. as to rules- try looking up E6, it is said to keep the high magic at bay, it's quite simple, and moves some of the focus of the character towards roleplay (though this last point is argued)

- Yora on this boards is developing a setting which you might like, with a set of rules that seem simple, variable, and fun. try looking her signature up.

- all that said, my suggestion would be to tell the guys "look, i want to try something. we'll run a short adventure by Fate rules, it's character creation (aspects) are really cool, and you can stack them for cool effects. give me 3-5 sessions, and if you don't like it, we go back to D&D. what do you say?"
get them to experiment, try the system at least. it's the best you can do.

hope this helped.
kol.