A One Mann’s Movies review of “Freakier Friday” (2025, 2*, PG).
I had high-hopes for “Freakier Friday”, this new Disney live-action sequel for a number of reasons. Firstly, I was a big fan of the original 2003 film “Freaky Friday” (itself a remake of the 1976 original starring Jodie Foster and Barbara Harris); I was duly impressed by how the casting team had been able to reassemble so many of the original cast; The trailer looked to be fun and engaging and the concept had potential; Having Lindsay Lohan occupied making this at least stopped her from filming yet another of her dreadful ‘Mills & Boon’ style barf-fests like “Irish Wish“!
But most of all, what a delight to find the Disney studios actually making live-action family films that were not animated reboots or Marvel shoot-’em-ups. I grew up in the 60’s and 70’s with films like “That Darn Cat” (1965), “The Love Bug” (1968) and “The World’s Greatest Athlete” (1973) – proper family films that are as rare as hen’s teeth in cinemas today. (“Harold and the Purple Crayon” came pretty close, but sadly and unfairly seemed to disappear with little trace.)
It pains me then to report that I see “Freakier Friday” as a swing and a miss for Disney: a view shared by the Illustrious Mrs Movie Man who was also highly anticipating seeing this. My rating below, by the way, includes an extra half star for ‘nostalgia value’.
Plot:
22-years since their body-switch ‘walking in each other’s paths’, Anna (Lindsay Lohan) and her mother Tess (Jamie Lee Curtis) are living successful lives. Anna is a music executive with Capitol Records and Tess continues as a respected psychoanalyst and is about to be a published author. New to the scene is Anna’s daughter Harper (Julia Butters) who Anna has brought up as a single mother.
After a whirlwind romance, Anna becomes engaged to top British chef Eric Reyes (Manny Jacinto), himself a single father to Lily (Sophia Hammons). Sadly, Harper and Lily fight like cat and dog and wish for nothing more than for Anna and Eric to fall out and never wed: a situation more easily enabled when the four women swap bodies.
Certification:
UK: PG; US: PG. (From the BBFC web site: “Mild bad language”.)
Talent:
Starring: Lindsay Lohan, Jamie Lee Curtis, Julia Butters, Sophia Hammons, Manny Jocinto, Mark Harmon, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, Christina Vidal, Haley Hudson, Chad Michael Murray, X Mayo, Lucille Soong, Rosalind Chao, Vanessa Bayer, Santina Muha, Ryan Malgarini.
Directed by: Nisha Ganatra.
Written by: Jordan Weiss. (Based on a story by Elyse Hollander & Jordan Weiss. Based on the book by Mary Rodgers and on characters created by Leslie Dixon & Heather Hach.)
Running Time: 1h 50m.
Summary:
Positives:
- It is really GREAT that Disney are making live-action family films again.
- The four leads do a great job, especially Jamie Lee Curtis and Julia Butters.
- It scores highly for nostalgia, given the scope of the returning cast.
Negatives:
- The script I found to be terrible: dull, unfunny and over-stuffed with dialogue.
- There are many moments where the momentum of the film just died for me and I was bored.
- The acting of many of the returning actors, appearing as cameos, was poor.
- What about the cancelled wedding plans??!
Full Review of “Freakier Friday”:
A script that only occasionally flickers into life.
I’m sure many of you will see this and love it. But I did not. As I said in my introduction, I thought the story had potential. Extending the body swapping to the next generation gives scope for lots of humour around a teen (Sophia Hammons) occupying the body of a creaky old-person (Jamie Lee Curtis). But for me the screenplay by Jordan Weiss singularly fails to deliver on that potential.
Yes, there are lots of smile-worthy moments in there when the script very occasionally flickers into life. And I did laugh… two or three times… mostly at the knee-cracking observations about the ravages of age (that I can sadly start to relate to). But three laughs does not make a comedy for me. In between those ‘flickers of life’ there are whole sections of the film that were just over-full of jabbering platitudes. There were some scenes where it felt like I was locked in a small room with four squawking flamingos that had been overfed on caffeine-infused ecstasy. In other sequences, I just got plain bored with it.
“Plagiarise, let no-one else’s work evade your eyes…”
I also have to call out in particular one scene where Anna (Lohan) has to learn to flirt for her ex-amour Jake (Chad Michael Murray). This – a young inexperienced person inhabiting an older woman’s body and being taught how to flirt – is a direct steal of exactly the same scene from “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle“. It’s still amusing enough here. But Karen Gillan did it SO much better in “Jumanji”.
And what about the wedding plans?
To be particularly picky about one of the plot points, this is all set on FRIDAY for a wedding that is due to happen on SUNDAY, and during the film, Harper (as Anna) maliciously rings up all of the wedding suppliers and cancels their involvement. And yet, miraculously, we get to (presumably) Sunday and the wedding is in full swing without any obvious off-licence boxes or McDonalds wrappers in sight!
Not for the want of the lead actors.
This failure, in my eyes, is down to the script and not the efforts of the four female leads who really give the material their best shot.
Jamie Lee Curtis is as impressive as ever and her fun fashion choices in the movie were carried off really well. She has recently said that she wants to soon retire before the industry “dumps her”, like she said it did her parents Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis. All I would say is that I don’t think that should be anytime soon with output like this.
Also particularly impressing me was young Julia Butters playing Harper. She was Claire in “The Gray Man” and also played the bespectacled Reggie Fabelman in “The Fabelmans“. Here she demonstrates a natural style good comic timing.
Lindsay Lohan and Sophia Hammons are also fine doing what they do: Lohan is far more suited to this sort of comedy fare than her romantic fluff.
Sadly, that praise can’t be extended to all of the host of returning actors (see below). Many were either not given enough to do, or – in doing it – were uncomfortably wooden.
Incredible casting.
Where I do have to take my hat off is to the casting team who managed, 22 years later, to secure an incredibly large proportion of the original cast from the 2003 film. Just look at this lot:
| Actor | Character | Photo | Note |
| Jamie Lee Curtis | Beth |  | Obviously Lee Curtis has to be in this, now upgraded to a Gran from just the Mum. |
| Lindsay Lohan | Anna |  | Again, essential for the remake, Lohan is now the single mum to Harper. |
| Chad Michael Murray | Jake |  | Jake, the motorcycling hunk from the original film returns and he is still romantically obsessed with Beth! (There’s a nice lookalike gag in the finale.) |
| Mark Harmon | Ryan |  | Beth’s husband at the end of the film is still hanging in there! |
| Christina Vidal | Maddie |  | Maddie was one of Anna’s fellow artists in the band “Pink Slip” as well as…. |
| Haley Hudson | Peg |  | …Peg who also returns. |
| Lucille Soong | Grandma Chiang |  | As the key driving force behind the events of the first film, Soong (who’ll be 90 years old next month!) amazingly returns here, but is sadly given little to do. |
| Rosalind Chao | Pei Pei |  | Chiang’s daughter also returns, but again just for a brief cameo. |
| Ryan Malgarini | Harry Coleman |  | Harry returns as Anna’s annoying younger brother, here just for a brief cameo. |
| Stephen Tobolowsky | Elton Bates |  | The legend that is Tobolowsky returns as Anna’s old, and now Harper’s current, schoolteacher. |
Tobolowsky, an actor with nearly 300 IMDB credits to his name but who is most famous for being Ned “Bing!” Ryerson in “Groundhog Day”, was the most joyous returnee in the piece for me. Anna (as Harper) comments as he walks in “Why have you never retired?” to which he responds that his pension fund invested poorly in crypto currency!
It’s truly impressive that of the original extensive cast of main characters, there are only TWO of them who have not returned for the sequel: both sadly for very good reasons:
| Actor | Character | Photo | Note |
| Harold Gould | Grandpa |  | Anna’s Grandpa. Sadly, the great and versatile actor Harold Gould died in 2010. |
| Willie Garson | Evan |  | Beth’s hypochondriac patient. Garson sadly died of pancreatic cancer in 2021 at the age of just 57. |
Evan is not specifically recast in the film, but it is clear to me that the character “Dad (SUV)” played by Steve Crystal who comments “That’s my therapist” is alluded to be Evan, 22 years later and still in therapy.
Summary Thoughts on “Freakier Friday”
I applaud the Disney execs for producing a live-action family film and I truly hope that the film does well at the box office so that they seek to continue that investment: who knows, perhaps in even something ORIGINAL for once?! But the film fundamentally disappointed me and I will not rush to rewatch this one when it appears, as it inevitably shortly will, on Disney+.
Where to watch?
Trailer for “Freakier Friday”:
The trailer is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7YJj6iO2QY.
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