LOS ANGELES, Aug. 5 (UPI) -- Freakier Friday, in theaters Friday, has a clever idea to expand the body swap comedy to include a blended family. Unfortunately, its sloppy execution fails to find humor in the situation, let alone address real struggles of blended families.
The forced exposition begins by catching up with Tess (Jamie Lee Curtis) and her daughter Anna (Lindsay Lohan), who switched bodies in the 2003 film Freaky Friday. Tess is still a therapist and author but delving into podcasting, which never comes up again.
Anna has become a music executive and single mother to a daughter, Harper (Julia Butters). Tess often oversteps by intruding on Anna's own parenting.
The more threatening issue is that Harper does not get along with Lily (Sophia Hammons), the daughter of Anna's fiance, Eric (Manny Jacinto). Therefore, the film has the four women swap bodies to teach a lesson.
Harper finds herself in Anna's body, while Lily is in Tess'. Anna is in Harper's body and Tess is in Lily's, meaning Lohan and Curtis are playing new characters, not each other like in the first movie. Butters and Hammons are playing the established Anna and Tess roles.
