Freaky

Director: Christopher Landon
Starring: Vince Vaughn, Kathryn Newton, Katie Finneran, Dana Drori, Celeste O' Connor, Misha Osherovich, Uriah Shelton, Alan Ruck, Melissa Collazo
Running Time: 101 min.
Rating: R 

★★★ (out of ★★★★) 

The body swap movie has always been a popular Hollywood standby, going all the way back to such titles as 18 Again!, Vice Versa and even the more contemporarily popular 13 Going on 30. Christopher Landon's Freaky has a unique take on this, adding comedic horror elements and a wildly effective gender flip to the equation. That it comes from the director of the underpraised, Groundhog Day-inspired Happy Death Day is of little surprise, with the two slashers sharing very similar sensibilities.This isn't quite as successful, but after an awkward start where the tone seems to be all over the place, it quickly settles into a groove, emerging more as a standout in a sub-genre where it seems as if everything's already been tried. 

It opens as the Scream sequel we never needed in going so over-the-top and self-referential to start that I half-expected the camera to pull back and reveal a theater full of cheering moviegoers. And when a giant title card reading "Wednesday the 11th" appears on screen, I figured it was only a matter of time. But no, this is all literally occurring, complete with a lanky, hulking figure who resembles Vince Vaughn offing teenagers in an intentionally cheap-looking monster mask stitched together from Leatherface and Michael Myers' leftovers. 

That this is a Blumhouse production makes perfect sense considering Blum himself has been trying obtain the remake rights to Friday the 13th, for which this opening sequence could be considered a trial run. The sequence ends with a clever tennis court kill that would immediately win any skeptic over. So  while still enagaging in a few familar tropes, this at least knows what it is and breaks free in a big way, thanks in no small part to a well-conceived scenario, lots of laughs and two opposing stars who literally and figuratively slay their roles. 

When four teenagers are murdered by the masked Blissfield Butcher (Vaughn), he's able to get his hands on an ancient dagger known as La Dola, the community goes on high alert. Bullied, insecure high school student Millie Kessler (Kathryn Newton) is still reeling from her father's sudden death a year ago, caring for her emotionally dependent, alcoholic mom, Coral (Katie Finneran) while older sister Charlene (Dana Drori), a police officer, dives into her work. After performing as the school mascot at the homecoming game, Millie's cornered alone by the Butcher, as he stabs her in the arm with the mystical dagger. 

With both waking up the next day realizing they've switched bodies, the Butcher now occupies Millie as she finds herself inhabiting the body of this serial killer. Conversely taking full advantage of his 17 year-old girl disguise, the Butcher goes to school and wreaks havoc as Millie, simultaneously shocking and exciting her peers with a dangerous new attitude. Meanwhile, the real Millie attempts to adjust to being stuck in a man's body, while trying to convince best friends Nyla (Celeste O' Connor) and Josh (Misha Osherovich) and crush Booker (Uriah Shelton) what's happened. But she'll need to take possession of the dagger and stab the Butcher by midnight to reverse the curse, or they'll be permanently trapped in the other's body. 

It's kind of a tradition in these movies that the two characters switch bodies due to some magical object they're exposed to, and as much as this film does differently, the script very much sticks to this. Even by those standards, the La Dola dagger that incites the switch is no more or less ridiculous than previous examples of this type of plot device. And no teen slasher could be complete without a central female character who's bullied for being either a "freak," or "loser," deemed undateable for no discernable reason other than they think they are, or maybe simply because it's high school. This can be challenging since the qualities they're looking for when casting an actress for that can sometimes oppose what's required when the cameras start rolling. She'll not only have to be popular and an outcast all at once, but pretend to inhabit the body of a killer more than twice her age and a different gender. 

Kathryn Newton deftly handles all of this as well as anyone could, marking it as a big, star-making outing for her after some rebellious teen turns on TV (Big Little Lies, Halt and Catch Fire) and the big screen (Blockers). While the movie lays it on pretty thick in the beginning to set everything up, it requires massive shifts in attitude and personality at the drop of a hat, providing a great showcase for a rapidly rising actress we'll definitely be seeing a lot more of. Once she does her slo-mo walk through the school's doors as Butcher it's game on, with the results being just as funny and thrilling as its wacky premise suggests. It also opens the floodgates for Millie's antagonists getting theirs, including Ferris Bueller's Alan Ruck, whose brief, but memorable work as an angry, abusive shop teacher is one of the movie's biggest treats, providing a textbook example of how to properly riff on a cult actor's reputation in a modern slasher.

You're initially sort of perplexed at Vince Vaughn's mannerisms as a teen girl, until the manhunt kicks in and he goes on the run, attempting to convince everyone he (or she) isn't what he appears to be. In this regard there are some great physical comedy scenes that revolve around the actor's size, more easily enabling the script to find ways for Millie to unlock the inner and outer strength residing in her, playing on the movie's themes. Because of its genre, and Vaughn's capabilities, this goes further you'd expect, with some highlights including a kitchen brawl with her friends and a great gag involving him bumbling around town in a creepy Aaron Rodgers mask. The height of Vaughn's portrayal comes in a department store fitting room conversation with Millie's mom who's completely unaware she's finally opening up to her own daughter, albeit while stuck in the body of a fugitive killer.   

Much of the third act revolves around comedic misunderstandings and mistaken identity scenarios, as it becomes a race to obtain the dagger and sell Millie's cop sister on the outrageous conceit that the murderer in her crosshairs is actually Millie. The ending is kind of a mixed bag in that it engages in something all slashers do, if rarely so blatantly. Given this is a parody of sorts, Landon gets away with it, even if you can't help but think there's an excised scene somewhere that clarifies a huge logic leap in the film's final few minutes. If it plays fast and loose with the rules even by horror comedy standards, Landon and co-writer Michael Kennedy earn points for a closing line that's memorable enough for them to deservedly be fist-bumping everyone in sight.

Freaky picks up steam and doesn't relent, exhausting every available plot avenue with its admittedly inspired twist on a familiar concept. You have to respect its willingness to go all the way with it, daring us to cringe and laugh in discomfort at its absurdity, which is exactly the point. Even if it all makes for a better body swap comedy than self-aware teen horror entry, we already have more than enough of the latter that it shouldn't matter one bit. It's easy to see what sets this apart, and there's little mystery in why fans of any genre would be raving about it.