Film

Freaky

Name: Freaky
Genre: Horror, Comedy
Released: 2020
Cast: Kathryn Newton, Vince Vaughn, Celeste O'Connor, Misha Osherovich, Uriah Shelton

A Friday the 13th knockoff gets grafted onto a teen sex comedy: a hulking, near-silent serial killer and an awkward high-schooler swap bodies via a cursed dagger, and each has to survive homecoming week as the other. Vince Vaughn commits fully to playing a terrified teenage girl trapped inside a killer's body, and the film mines real laughs from that mismatch without skimping on the gore. Broad, gleeful, disposable fun.

TMDb rating

6.5

If you liked this

Happy Death Day2017

Same writer-director working the same trick — take a hoary slasher premise, hand it to a sharp comic lead, let the horror double as a teen-movie problem to solve. Groundhog Day with a mask-wearing killer.

But The time-loop repeats by design, and if you want gore over cleverness this one is comparatively bloodless.

Scream1996

The blueprint for every self-aware slasher comedy since, including Freaky's trick of loving the genre while poking it in the ribs. Sharp, funny, and still genuinely tense.

But The fashion and phone technology date it hard, and its twists are pretty much common knowledge by now.

Tucker and Dale vs. Evil2010

Flips the slasher formula so the 'killers' are sweet hillbillies and the panicking teens are the real menace — the same structural inversion that makes Freaky sing, aimed at a different trope.

But Broader, goofier comedy than horror; if you wanted more scares than laughs it leans too far the other way.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Your Name.2016

Freaky's whole engine — two people waking up in each other's bodies — is the exact premise of this tender, melancholic Japanese animated hit, just stripped of blades and comedy and aimed at the heart instead of the funny bone.

One of the most beautiful, purely felt animated films of the last decade, using its body-swap gimmick to ask what it means to truly know someone — gorgeous, funny, and eventually devastating.

But No gore, no jokes at anyone's expense, no Vince Vaughn — if you came for slasher thrills, this quiet romance is a different planet.

Ready or Not2019

A pitch-black comedy that never stops being funny while people are actually dying, with a lead carrying the same tone-whiplash Newton and Vaughn pull off here.

But Wedding-day satire of the rich, not body-swap horror, so the connection is mood and momentum rather than plot.

The Final Girls2015no page yet

Teens get sucked inside an '80s slasher movie and have to survive its rules — another loving, funny deconstruction of exactly the genre Freaky is remixing.

But Lower budget and less starpower; charming rather than dazzling, and a sincere emotional subplot slows the fun.

Jennifer's Body2009

A teenage girl's body becomes something monstrous and funny at once, with Diablo Cody's snap-crackle dialogue giving the horror the same sardonic teen-movie voice.

But Tonally slipperier and sadder underneath the jokes; if you want pure fun without an ache, it might not sit right.

Fright Night2011no page yet

A glossy, funny, R-rated horror remake with a genuinely game villain performance, in the same spirit of polishing B-movie material into something this enjoyable.

But Vampires, not slashers, and less interested in body-swap identity games — the connection here is tone, not mechanics.

Idle Hands1999no page yet

A stoner horror comedy about a body doing violent things its owner can't control — a scrappier, cruder cousin to Freaky's identity swap, with plenty of splatstick charm.

But Cheaper, sillier, and more dated; the humor is broad slapstick rather than Freaky's sharper teen-movie wit.

Child's Play2019no page yet

Proof the 'killer inhabiting an unexpected body' trick still works when done with real craft — this remake takes a schlocky premise seriously enough to be both scary and funny.

But Doll horror rather than body-swap, and less interested in comedy than Freaky; more straightforwardly frightening throughout.

Face/Off1997

Same identity-swap engine as Freaky, dressed up as a big, dumb action thriller instead of horror-comedy — two actors physically performing each other's mannerisms, pushed to gloriously absurd extremes.

Nicolas Cage and John Travolta swap faces and spend two hours impersonating each other with wonderfully unhinged commitment, in one of the most purely entertaining action movies ever made.

But It's action, not horror, with zero interest in scares — the pleasures here are explosions and scenery-chewing, not dread.

Freaky Friday2003no page yet

Freaky's title is a direct pun on this — the same body-swap engine, just run through a Disney family comedy instead of a slasher movie, proving how old and elastic the premise really is.

Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan swap bodies and steal each other's lives for a day, in a warm, genuinely funny family comedy that shaped the mold Freaky is gleefully smashing.

But Zero horror, zero blood, aimed squarely at tweens — if you want anything dark or edgy it will feel weightless by comparison.