Freakier Friday Review

Against the odds, Freakier Friday delivers on its promise, revitalizing an iconic early noughties classic in a way that feels fresh, worthy but also just like the OG!

20 years on from the original, Freakier Friday finds Anna Coleman (Lindsay Lohan) as a single mother to Harper (Julia Butters) - a position that has her mother Tess (Jamie Lee Curtis) obsessed with filling a pseudo-parent role to her granddaughter. When Anna and British single dad Eric Reyes (Manny Jacinto) hit it off, however, they bring Eric’s daughter Lily (Sophia Hammons) into the fold - a potential chaotic collision, as Lily and Harper hate each other at school. With Eric and Anna’s wedding only days away, Anna, Tess, Lily and Harper’s disharmony spill over and, with a chance encounter with a psychic, they wake up to find themselves switched into one another’s bodies! Not again!

Freakier Friday could have gone off the rails in a million ways, but by staying close to the plot, tone and structure of the original, director Nisha Ganatra manages to capture that early 2000’s magic in a way that really works.

One of the best bits about this movie is how funny it is. This film will have you laughing consistently throughout, with the jokes playing into that bygone era of comedy with the occasional burst of the whippy modern dialogue that tends to plague comedies these days.

It’s lovely to see the cast back, including a range of the classic side characters. And Julia Butters and Sophia Hammons do fine work as the younger ‘switchees’ in this iteration. But this movie belongs once again to the incomparable duo of Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis.

Lohan, looking like she hasn’t aged a day since 2003, brings the heart and charm, along with plenty of laughs, making a strong case for studios to get her out of her resurgent Netflix whirlpool and back on the big screen in a more consistent capacity. Curtis is unbeatable, not just wonderful in the quiet moments, but absolutely committed to the slapstick of it all. I haven’t laughed as hard as I did when she had to get ‘essentials’ in the diaper aisle in years.

The visuals are pretty average, with cinematography taking on more of a streaming feel. And indeed, early in this film you might question ‘why did they bring this to theatres instead of streaming?’ But by the end of this movie, there is no doubt in your mind. This is an absolutely hilarious film with a lot of charm, a movie that will make you feel and laugh in equal measure, and one that will have you longing for the 2000’s again. An absolute triumph, that deserves to be seen on the big screen!

 

Freakier Friday wondrously avoids every Disney-sequel pitfall to deliver a film that rivals, if not bests, the original. Absolutely hilarious, see it immediately.

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