Freakier Friday
Cast: Jamie Lee Curtis, Lindsey Lohan, Julia Butters
Writer: Jordan Weiss, Elyse Hollander
Director: Nisha Ganatra
**** out of Five
Our favorite mother and daughter duo who switched bodies return in this latest legacy sequel that actually improves upon the original from 2003. Which was a remake of a movie that was released in 1976 which was adapted from a novel from 1972.
Anna Coleman(Lindsey Lohan) has met the love of her life in Eric Davies (Manny Jacinto) and is prepared to get married. Everyone is happy about the engagement except her daughter Harper(Julia Butters). Especially when she learns that they are moving from L.A. to London and that her soon to be stepsister is a snobby little girl her school named Lily(Sophia Hammons). Tensions between Anna and her mother,Tess Coleman(Jamie Lee Curtis) begin to raise when she finds out that Harper was invited to live with her grandma if they decide to move. After a chance meeting with a psychic(Vanessa Bayer) at a bachelorette party(don’t explain how) The four woman are switch places with eachother. Anna has switched places with her daughter Harper and her mother Tess has swapped with her future grand stepdaughter, Lily.
The four leads are actually quite good when they are portraying the others. There is some great comedic scenes between Hammons and Butters as they realize they are in much younger bodies and can’t get hurt as bad. Lohan and Curtis do a lot more together in this one than the previous film and their comedic timing is classic stuff. Seeing them act young while also being in bodies that can’t handle it is great physical comedy. Their plot line is a twist on the feature, The Parent Trap(which also featured Lohan in the remake).
As a sequel, Freakier Friday does fall into a lot of the same tropes and callbacks from the first film of 03 but it doesn’t fully hurt it. Those moments that fans recognize are very few and the way they are used bring in a lot of great humor and heart to the story. The director and writers know that this premise is kind of ridiculous to begin with and so the whole feature is done in this sitcom like style which may annoy some people but for this comedy it works. When things do become dramaticit felt natural but ones could argue that they come off as formulated in their approach. Having it being directed and written by women for women was the right thing for this new entry.
Glad to see Lindsey Lohan back and I really hope she gets offered more roles because she was a lot of fun. I really hope that her and Jamie Lee Curtis return for a non body swap movie. Julia Butters who was best known for her performance against Leorando DiCaprio in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood had good leading star material and with the right script and director. She could become one of our best new young actors. If she isn’t picked up by Marvel or DC and turned into a franchise character.
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