REVIEW: ‘Freakier Friday’ Made Me Feel Old And That Was The Point

I am notoriously not in favor of revivals, remakes, and sequels to films made 20 years ago just to keep a license or cash in on a nostalgia token. But lately, I’ve been eating crow. And Freakier Friday, the sequel film to the Disney remake of the 1970s film, is making it happen yet again.

Directed by Nisha Ganatra, written by Jordan Weiss and Elyse Hollander, and genuinely bringing back every memorable member of the original cast, including and most importantly, Pink Slip, Freakier Friday is nostalgic done right. The film captures the past but also understands the new generation coming into its audience. 

Essentially, Freaky Friday 2, this Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis-fronted film doesn’t rest on its laurels but expands its message instead. The film also stars Julia Butters, Sophia Hammons, Manny Jacinto, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, Rosalind Chao, Chad Michael Murray, Vanessa Bayer, and Mark Harmon.

Freakier Friday embraces nostalgia without sacrificing new perspectives.

In Freakier Friday, Curtis and Lohan reprise their roles as Tess and Anna Coleman. Picking up 22 years after Tess and Anna switched bodies right before Tess’s wedding and learned to appreciate each other, the body-swap happens again. Only now, Anna has a daughter of her own, Harper (Julia Butters), and a soon-to-be stepdaughter, Lilly (Sophia Hammons). As they navigate the challenges that come when two families come together, before Anna marries Eric (Manny Jacinto), lightning strikes twice, but with a more nuanced message.

Anna is a successful manager with a pop icon (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan) client, writing music in secret to keep her creativity alive now that Pink Slip is long gone. Tess is writing books, taking her therapy to podcasts, and competing in pickleball with Ryan (Mark Harmon). But now, Anna is a single mom and Tess is stepping up (and in the way) to take care of Harper. Everyone is older, including us, watching.

There is a point in the film where Anna’s age is mentioned. It’s a point that sharpens the generational divide and made me feel even older than I did watching the new I Know What You Did Last Summer. Older millennials are finding themselves at the point where we are now watching mother-daughter movies, where we are the moms. While Lindsay Lohan is younger than Jamie Lee Curtis in the original body-swap, the point still hits. 

Somehow, Freakier Friday makes a familiar story feel unique.

I’m old now. And I don’t say this like Lilly does when she wakes up and sees herself in the mirror for the first time, yelling about the caverns in Tess’s face. I’m in my mid-thirties, millennials like my husband are hitting that 40 mark, and yet, because of our connected world, obsessions with skin care, and the increased pressure to be young, we are pushing off our age as much as we can. But in doing that, we push our assumptions and comforts onto the Gen Z below us. 

While Freaky Friday, as a potential franchise, is about investigating the relationship between mothers and daughters, it is also about speaking across generations. Like the first film, director Nisha Ganatra‘s Freakier Friday isn’t just about the similarities that both sides of a divide feel, but also the differences. Where a lot of stories aim to say that mothers and daughters are more alike than they are different, Freaky Friday (2003), and even more in Freakier Friday, we see the differences highlighted and respected. 

As a Freaky Friday sequel, this film risked undoing the progress that we saw between Anna and Tess in the first film. Instead, it expands the body-swap and switches focus, adding in the concept of blended families, and showing how a maternal relationship shifts once you have kids of your own. 

Millennials are now the parents in movies, and Freakier Friday wants you to feel old, in a good way.

Freakier Friday aged with its audiences. It makes fun of today’s teens in the way that we see them, and it makes fun of today’s moms in the way that teens view them. For me, at least, even without kids, the lenses through which we view Tess, Anna, Harper, and Lilly are highly nuanced. Nothing is cut and dry, and instead of rehashing long conversations about grief and fearing entering a new family, Freakier Friday decides to just show it. 

While the movie plays heavy to its core audience of women who were teens when the first one came out, taking all of our favorite bits and playing with them effortlessly (particularly around Anna’s ex-boyfriend Jake, played by Chad Michael Murray), it doesn’t forget the newer audiences this will bring in. This is a film that knows it is meeting a new generation and balancing that against its older audience, and in that process, it never talks down to either group. 

One of the strongest new elements of the film is that it takes on blended families. Freakier Friday’s story is nearly a one-to-one of the original, only now, it’s adding in a new concept that is almost harder to navigate than mothers and daughters. Harper is in the same position her mother was, only now, her school rival is becoming her sister.

Julia Butters and Sophia Hammons are perfect new additions to the cast.

Harper isn’t embodying traditional femininity. She’s more focused on surfing than what she wears, and cut-off jean shorts have more appeal than anything designed, and she aims to be low maintenance. Lilly is on the other end. She wants to be a fashion designer and she projects confidence to everyone, embodying a daddy’s princess energy if I’ve ever seen on screen. 

The girls couldn’t be farther from each other, and it’s because of that gap between personalities that they don’t believe their parents should be together. Of course, marriage means a significant life change for someone. Either they all go back to England, or they all stay in Los Angeles. Between the two, Harper can’t understand why someone wouldn’t want to stay in California, but Lilly wants to be where she lost her mom. 

As the two begin to see each other with more empathy, Lilly is allowed to grieve and cry on her terms. During one scene, Harper and Lilly (as Lohan and Curis, of course) are sitting on the beach watching the waves. The day has been stressful, but they’ve grown closer at the same time, or at least hate each other a little less. 

Freaky Friday 2 still caters to its older audience, but doesn’t forget the teens in the theater.

Harper offers to listen to Lilly’s problems with Los Angeles, to which Lilly declines. It’s not a decline of conversation built on anger or the need to keep distance from Harper. Instead, Lilly explains that if she talks about her mom, she feels that she is giving away the last pieces of her that she has left. In a movie packed with physical comedy gags, loud moments of absolutely dumb decisions, and jokes that don’t believe in subtlety, this one scene speaks volumes. 

Instead of doubling down on the message from the first film, Freakier Friday aims to expand it. We still have mothers and daughters understanding each other, and ultimately, for the older women, understanding themselves. But what really matters here is that the film explores the ripples in everyone’s lives when two families come together. If anything, Freakier Friday is asking its teen audience to understand their parents with greater importance than we saw in the last film.

Still, a significant reason that the film’s narrative works is because of its cast. Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis still have chemistry as strong as ever. Only now, they’re two teens playing a grandma and mother, which allows the duo to highlight their connection differently. The three new additions to the cast also capture the audience. Julia Butters and Sophia Hammons hold their own in the film as well, with enough charisma to pull everyone in. 

This is the Lindsay Lohan Renaissance millennials have been waiting for.

But the standout of the new cast is Manny Jacinto. Eric, Lilly’s father, is both a caring father and loving fiancé. His kindness exudes as much charisma as his looks do, and that’s what makes him the perfect Prince Charming. While Freakier Friday certainly highlights his looks, it’s his love that shines through as his daughter and soon-to-be step-daughter begin to understand why he wants to marry Anna. 

Love takes the spotlight in all its shapes. We see romantic love, maternal love, and friendship grow. But we also see the selfishness that comes from that, and how hard it is to see beyond yourself as a teen. And in Anna’s case, how to be open to your daughter instead of holding it all in. 

As a whole, Freakier Friday made me feel old. I mean, it’s the first time I’ve seen a film and then realized that I was the age of the mom on screen. But that’s the point. Like the one before it, this take on a Freaky Friday 2 wants you to accept where you are in life, but in doing so, understand others. All jokes aside, this nostalgic trip has a solid heart. 

Freakier Friday is playing in theaters nationwide August 8, 2025.