 Freaky Friday (2003) The 1976 Disney flick has been given a makeover, with Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan switching bodies after being benevolently cursed by a meddling Chinese woman who wants them to stop bickering. The two leads are outstanding, especially Curtis as a driven career gal getting remarried three years after her husband's death. She brings a depth of emotion that you don't often find in the typical family-targeted film. The script is smart and legitimately hip – praising the Vines, for example, but dissing the White Stripes – managing to avoid the exuberant cluelessness that would normally plague such a project … instead of trying to be cool, it somehow just is cool. Jaded as I am about pop culture, I couldn't find much fault with the writing or direction. There's a pretty damn funny child actor playing Lohan's annoying little brother, which is another pitfall avoided. And you just can't go wrong with a climax that shows Jamie Lee Curtis playing a blistering electric guitar solo. Sure, the whole body-switching idea barely sustains a feature-length film, but this one's a lot of fun. Perhaps 15 minutes longer than it should be, but I remedied that by going for a quick pee and a smoke about 2/3 of the way through.
Review by Suzie Cant |