THE STORY – Twenty-two years after Tess and Anna swapped bodies, Anna now has a daughter of her own and a soon-to-be stepdaughter. As they navigate the myriad challenges that come when two families merge, Tess and Anna discover lightning might indeed strike twice.
THE CAST – Jamie Lee Curtis, Lindsay Lohan, Julia Butters, Sophia Hammons, Manny Jacinto, Chad Michael Murray & Maitreyi Ramakrishnan
THE TEAM – Jordan Weiss (Director/Writer) & Elyse Hollander (Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 85 Minutes
Given the Walt Disney Company’s extensive back catalogue, it’s a little surprising that they’ve only forced the remake and sequel treatment on their animated classics in recent years. Despite besmirching the legacy of genre giants like “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” and “Pinocchio,” the closest Disney has gotten to remaking their live-action properties has been David Lowry’s lyrical update of “Pete’s Dragon,” a live-action/animation hybrid in its original form, and the legacy sequels “Mary Poppins Returns” and “Tron: Legacy.” Now comes “Freakier Friday,” a legacy sequel to 2003’s “Freaky Friday,“ itself a remake of the 1976 Disney classic of the same name. Considering the overall quality of these films compared to the live-action (or “live-action,“ in some cases) remakes of their animated classics, perhaps Disney should stick to remaking and sequelizing their live-action IP in the future, as they all not only retain the charm of the originals but add some new magic all their own. In “Freakier Friday,“ the appeal doesn’t just stem from watching stars Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis reprise their roles after two decades, but also from witnessing the younger actresses working alongside them find their footing.
Twenty-two years after their freaky body switch, Anna (Lohan) and Tess (Curtis) are living together again so that Tess can help Anna raise her daughter Harper (Julia Butters) as a single parent. Tess knows how hard it can be and genuinely wants to help, but constantly keeps stepping on Anna’s toes. Harper isn’t helping, as she sneaks out in the mornings to go surfing and gets into an argument with her new British lab partner, Lily (Sophia Hammons), which results in an explosion. Anna is under enough stress with her job managing up-and-coming pop sensation Ella (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan). Still, when she meets Lily’s chef father, Eric (Manny Jacinto), a single parent himself, it’s love at first sight for them both. Six months later, much to their daughters’ chagrin, Anna and Eric are getting married and deciding whether to move to London or stay in California. Unable to step outside of their feelings and understand what each other is going through, a pair of palm readings from psychic/Reiki healer/business card designer Jen (Vanessa Bayer) sets another body swap into motion, this time doubled. With Harper and Lily ending up in Anna and Tess’s bodies, and vice versa, they all must find a way to make Jen’s prophecy about fixing each others’ hearts come to pass while getting through a day that includes a major photo shoot for Ella, Anna and Eric’s immigration interview, and the wedding party’s rehearsal dinner at Eric’s restaurant. But with Harper and Lily working together to break up the wedding, will any of them survive this even freakier Friday intact?
A premise this wacky requires a strong rhythm section to keep the rest of the filmmaking band from going off the rails. “Freakier Friday“ has that in the form of screenwriter Jordan Weiss and director Nisha Ganatra, who make sure the film feels as much like the original as possible. The glossy look, soundtrack choices, and style of humor on display beautifully capture the spirit of the 2003 version without ever feeling like an homage to the time period; it feels like an actual continuation of Anna and Tess’s story instead of transposing one era onto another. While most legacy sequels feel more like contemporary films than the films that inspired them, “Freakier Friday“ feels exactly like the original, to its benefit. Yes, many of the plot and comedy beats are straight out of the original, but Ganatra and Weiss give them enough of a twist so that they don’t feel like retreads, and the cast is so locked in that every emotion lands.
A body-swap comedy needs strong performers to work; otherwise, the illusion falls apart. Despite two decades of distance from these characters, Curtis and Lohan transition into these older versions of Tess and Anna seamlessly. Their chemistry is just as sparkling as it was in the original, and the maturity they’ve both gained as performers over the years is on full display. Lohan gets to have fun acting out as a teenager again, fully committing to every over-the-top bit of physical comedy; her attempted seduction of Anna’s ex, Jake (the returning Chad Michael Murray), proves she still has all the precociousness she had in her younger years, as well as the good instincts to know how much is too much. She’s also still able to blindside you with emotional vulnerability when called upon to do so. The actress’s résumé hasn’t been filled with bangers of late, but this is easily her best performance since the height of her 2000s stardom.
As in 2003, Curtis has the showier part, and with the wider age gap between Tess and Lily here, that’s dialed up even more. Curtis has always been a game comedienne willing to do just about anything for a laugh, and she remains unafraid to look completely ridiculous, wearing some heinous outfits, applying insane amounts of lip plumper, and crawling around on the floor, unable to get up. She’s great fun, whether as Tess or as Lily in Tess’s body, but even Curtis can’t pull the latter off all the time, occasionally playing things too subtly for us to see the teenager inside the grandmother’s body. Even still, both she and Lohan are such pros that the over-the-top mugging for the camera that’s required of every live-action Disney comedy comes across as endearingly entertaining rather than annoying.
The nature of the story is such that Butters and Hammons have the more dramatic roles, mostly serving as the straight men to the more raucous Curtis-Lohan duo once the swap happens and the adults are in the children’s bodies. They carry the dramatic weight of the story with ease, turning in moments of surprising subtlety alongside the well-played moments of broad comedy, like when they realize their younger bodies can eat all the junk food they want without worrying about high blood pressure, cholesterol, or diabetes. The rest of the ensemble is just as good, with Murray a hoot still lusting after Curtis’s Tess and Jacinto an all-too-perfect charmer (even if his British accent sometimes disappears) with some impressive dance moves.
Nothing in “Freakier Friday“ is all that subtle. Hence, the fact that all four central performances manage to hit the dramatic beats at just the right pitch for maximum emotional impact deserves applause. But while that lack of subtlety may turn some off, it arguably doesn’t belong in a “Freaky Friday“ sequel at all. There’s never been anything understated about the property’s “walk a mile in someone else’s shoes“ premise, and this sequel quite literally doubles down on that. That message couldn’t be timelier, though, and “Freakier Friday“ puts it across with the kind of solid craftsmanship and all-ages entertainment value that we used to take for granted from Disney. That we finally got it in a “Freaky Friday“legacy sequel, of all things, is surprising, but it’s a win nonetheless.