Freaky (2020)
"After swapping bodies with a deranged serial killer, a young girl in high school discovers she has less than 24 hours before the change becomes permanent."
Freaky wastes no time in establishing itself as a horror comedy. The deaths in the opening scene as the Butcher makes his mark are just so stupid and ridiculous, and it paves the mood of the rest of the film. The humor in the movie as a whole is okay, but the crazy murders keep the consistent levity of the movie.
We all know the tale of Freaky Friday, whether you watched the original film or the Lindsay Lohan edition. This creative twist on story was quite clever, and thankfully utilized well in the film. The first half of the movie is really good and presented an intriguing adventure. However the second half of the film fell flat to me. The pacing started to drag on and it seemed like forever for the movie to end. The ending itself was okay, but when watching Freaky, the first half is more entertaining part.
Vince Vaughn & Kathryn Newton are undoubtedly the stars of the show. Vince did a good job of being the menacing Butcher; and I'm sure he had plenty of fun pretending to be a teenage girl. His performance probably would've been funnier, but Jack Black raised the bar for grown men pretending to be a teenage girl (if you can even say that's a thing) in the recent Jumanji movies, so the entire film I kept comparing the two, deciding Jack Black was the better performance.
Kathryn Newton did such a great job of establishing the sweet character of Millie, but when the swap happened, she gave it her all. She played crazy evil so well. No offence to Vince, but Kathryn was the better actor here. I loved it when she was on screen and I really enjoyed her performances of both characters overall.
I wouldn't watch it again, but it was cute. Freaky would work well as a one time slumber party flik, especially if the theme is cheesy horror films. If you're looking for a good High School horror movie, or a film where a teenage girl is stuck in a grown man's body, then Scream and Jumanji are the movies I'd recommend before this one.
My Rating: ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆