Directed By Nisha Ganatra

Starring – Jamie Lee Curtis, Lindsay Lohan, Julia Butters

The Plot – 22 years after Tess (Curtis) and Anna (Lohan) endured an identity crisis, Anna now has a daughter (Butters) and a soon-to-be stepdaughter (Sophia Hammons). As they navigate the challenges that come when two families merge, Tess and Anna discover that lightning might strike twice.

Rated PG for thematic elements, rude humor, adult language and some suggestive references

Freakier Friday | Official Trailer | In Theaters August 8

POSITIVES

In recent years, the legacy sequel has become a subgenre of its own, but while most of these recently shallow cash grabs beckon an uninspiring emphasis to their nostalgic exploit, “Freakier Friday” does provide ample heart to its otherwise familiar foundation, allowing this inferior but solid sequel the ability to transcend this feeling like a creative rehashing of the 2003 original movie. The script is most integral to this cause, despite its evidential inconsistencies, both with four people involved to the character transformation, this time around, which is surprisingly not as convoluted and confusing as I expected after the movie’s marketing trailers, but also the film’s desire to tell a story pertaining to step families, with all of its own pocketed conflicts to feed into the film’s comedy and underlining drama simultaneously. While a majority of the gags revolve around ageist observations, with the elderly inhabitants being plagued by frailty, while the youthful inhabitants flourish in bodily resiliency, the overriding narrative pertaining to the accessibility in seeing things from an entirely different perspective bares just as much meaningful merit to character integrities as the original film did, culminating in an effective climax that not only forces the characters to confront their own insecurities with connectively revealing interaction, but also a moving third act that will cement a charmed feeling to those seeking a legitimate sequel, with even meticulously measured elements of nostalgic Easter eggs that the screenwriters have enough faith in their audience to assemble meaning without feeling heavily obvious or requiring clumsy flashbacks (I’m talking to you, “Happy Gilmore 2”). As for some of that aforementioned comedic material, the gags themselves are far from anything innovative or evoking gut-busting laughter, but the talents of this ensemble go a long way towards extending their collective shelf life, with delightful energy and commitment to portrayal that does offer situational hilarity in the awkwardness of being forced to portray someone that these four characters so obviously are not. The best of them, as no surprise, are Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan, who both not only step back seamlessly into the shoes of their respective characters with impeccably lived-in chemistry that cements their confrontationally bickering dynamic, but also steal the show with a palpable infectiousness to their deliveries that continuously charmed the pants off of me, despite deliveries that I saw coming from a mile away. While I wish more subtle nuances were given to their respective portrayals in ways that could allow me to see the real person from within, particularly a British accent to Curtis’ approach, each of the four actresses know exactly what it takes to ratchet the vulnerabilities of their respective designs, and as a result unleashes generational commentary to their various conflicts that offers something endearing for everyone in the audience, without a weak link among the bunch. Beyond all of this, it was a bit of a disappointment to hear that Mark Waters wasn’t returning for this sequel, as I truly feel his expressively energetic direction supplanted strings of personality to the original film, however Nisha Ganatra makes the transition feel as seamlessly kinetic as possible, both with stylistic transitions and a guitar heavy score from Amie Doherty that effortlessly elicits the pop punk aura in atmosphere of the 2003 original. For everything that Ganatra lacks in the underlining urgency of the narrative, she more than makes up for in appraising a secondary effort more than two decades later that feels like it was made within a couple of years as that previous film, and considering a woman’s perspective here does feel like it gets us closer to those tender moments and insecurities that come to define these characters and their respective dynamics, I think a substitution is just what was needed for this cherished property, commanding an entertaining engagement without anything truly harmful to the original film’s foundation.

NEGATIVES

As for some of the inconsistencies within that screenplay, the film does feel a bit obviously overstuffed by its midway point, as a result of a variety of splitting time subplots that become tediously intrusive to the film’s pacing. While I can understand giving each of these women their own arcs does appraise meaning to their characters, the real problems are in the overbearing indulgences to some of the situational conflicts post-transformation, which definitely could’ve used another cut in the editing chair, making some scenes feel like they drown on for an eternity, all the while taking focus away from the primary conflicts in the narrative that distance our two groups of pocketed duos for much longer than I would’ve appreciated. Moments like a Pickleball tournament sequence and immigration office appointment are just two examples of scenes that could’ve definitely been cut from the finished product, as they drag down the movie’s imagery while not necessarily adding anything of impact to a character’s overarching quest On top of this, the script is plagued desperately by an inescapable predictability factor that failed to elicit any semblance of surprising impact to this secondary effort, which has been a staple of Disney live action properties for as long as I can remember. Even before the second act came to fruition, I accurately pieced together everything about the ending, but also the exploration, in ways that made it feel like I’ve seen the movie before actually finishing it, and considering the movie has so much to offer to its fandom, I feel like it’s this unfortunately glaring aspect that makes the film feel like its debut belongs on Disney Plus, instead of the silver screen, leaving so much opportunity on the creative table to surmise some unforeseen stakes to these circumstances, but in ways that aren’t as conveniently resolved (As expected) by film’s end. It also feels like a responsible take to tell elder audiences that this movie makes no reservations in outlining the physical ailments that dampen the moods of its youthful protagonists portraying them, making this feel like an imbalanced onslaught towards the elderly in ways that inevitably won’t charm audiences of this demographic. For a 40-year-old male like me, the material might not bare a striking resemblance to the bouts with bodily hilarity that typically end in humiliation, but I can certainly see the other side of the gender dilemma within such material that inadvertently could inscribe an inferiority complex from within them, and those seeking to see the movie would be better served if they’re comfortable in the bodies that movies should be celebrating instead of condemning. Another essence of streaming quality definitely pertains to the movie’s presentation, with its overly lit and flatness for shallow depth that emits a glaring artificiality to the movie’s canvas. It might feel a bit silly to complain about such artistry in a movie about body transformation, but some sequences play particularly ugly on the biggest screen imaginable, and would’ve been better suited in the obscurities of an at home set to hide its transparency, especially during ambitious sequences involving Tess and Anna flying through the air while going top speeds in a race car over narrow street hills, which are so obviously enacted with a painted backdrop.

OVERALL
“Freakier Friday” is a bubbly energetic and mostly harmless nostalgic confection that might not reinvent the wheel with body-swap movies of similar structure, but finds its strides in the frenzy of two foundational performances from Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan, who each step back seamlessly into their respective portrayals. While the movie is unavoidably overstuffed with a barrage of various subplots and conflicts to its 106-minute runtime, as well as a bit cheap looking, it’s never the less an unabashedly charming sequel that expands upon an ages old formula, justifying its existence with a meticulously measured means of nostalgia that is uses without demeaning the intelligence of the audience it mentally springs from.

My Grade: 6.9 or C+