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FREAKY

Cert 15

98 mins

BBFC advice: Contains strong gory violence, threat, sex, very strong language

Vince Vaughn running around with barely controlled limbs, screeching as if he has the mind of a teenage girl!

Oh, gosh. No wonder people are not being inspired to return to the cinema in significant numbers.

Freaky's premise that a serial killer (Vaughn) swaps bodies with a geeky schoolgirl, Millie (Kathryn Newton), is mesmerisingly odd.

Added to the displeasure is the avalanche of fake blood to accompany gory onscreen slayings.

In the opening scenes, Millie is merely trying to survive the daily horrors of Blissfield High with the usual assortment of appalling teenage stereotypes.

Then, after a particularly humiliating experience at a sporting event, she is left waiting alone to be picked up and, consequently at the mercy of the bloodthirsty butcher (Vaughn) who has already bumped off four of her peers.

She escapes but, for reasons which are impossible to fathom, his ancient dagger causes the killer and the girl's bodies to be switched.

And if this wasn't enough of an inconvenience, she has only 24 hours to switch back or the situation is irreversible.

This means that she needs to try to resolve this rather acute crisis in the form of a middle-aged male giant and if she doesn't she will have a hairy chest for life.

Meanwhile, the killer is causing mayhem while looking like an attractive but usually meek teenage girl.

I am not completely against body-swap films - Big, starring Tom Hanks is one of my favourites, and I was gripped by Face Off with John Travolta and Nicolas Cage.

But they both have fine writing and quality acting to back up the original premise.

Freaky has neither. It is meant to be funny but isn't - the joke lasts precisely one Vince Vaughn shriek.

Thus, the humour gap is filled by bodies being mutilated - something which tends to prompts laughs from kids in the back seat rather than 58-year-old blokes sitting at the front.

In other words, Christopher Landon's film wasn't aimed at me. As I haven't transformed into a teenage girl, I can only say as I see through these old male eyes and I thought it was a stinker.

Reasons to watch: Vince Vaughn prancing like a teenage girl

Reasons to avoid: Vince Vaughn prancing like a teenage girl

Laughs: One chuckle

Jumps: None

Vomit: None

Nudity: None

Overall rating: 2/10

Did you know? The original name of the film was Freaky Friday the 13th, a reference to the various Freaky Friday (1976) films, about a mother and daughter body-swapping, and the Friday the 13th (1980) films.

The final word. Vince Vaughn: "“For me personally, I really don’t care to a large degree about people’s opinions. How I feel about my choices and what I’m doing, whether that’s in your work or in your own life — that is more of a focal point to me than ‘Is it coming off well?’ ” LA Times

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