Top 10 Freaky Plastic Surgery Films for Jamie Lee Curtis

by Chad Aiggia, Freelance Correspondent

Because we love Jamie Lee Curtis at all her ages au naturel, including now as older JLC, who just spoke out in “The Guardian”(UK) news pages against the odd-faced Hollywood obsession with plastic surgery? Screenmancer presents a very unusual entry in our Top 10’s this Summer dedicated to her. That would be Top 10 Freaky Plastic Surgery Flicks we picked out as a nod of respect to Jamie Lee Curtis, our face-card for women who want to keep their mug the same as it always was: lined and loved.

First let’s plug Jamie Lee Curtis’ new reboot, Freakier Friday, set for theatrical release Aug. 8, 2025. Here’s the Disney official trailer:

Fans, do we care that Annette Bening and Michelle Trachenberg were allegedly slated for the first Freaky Friday in 2003, but both pulled out, to be replaced by now legendary freak-duo JLC and Lindsay Lohan? No, we do not.

Nor do we care that both JLC and Linds have had their swirl around the scandal hole that is Hollywood, because whether it’s a pill-popper addiction or driving under the influence that plagues our leads? Both of these Freaky Friday dynamo body swappers have thrilled us in audiences for years.

We don’t even care whether they went under the knife, however…

Sure as a Star is Born, it is an indisputable fact careers of some of the industry’s big stars have been enhanced by plastic surgery. Not to mention non-Hollywood Influencer types like Kris Jenner, and her recent re-upholstery that likely 100% shocked even Kim Kardashian at the freakish time-machine effect.

No Kardashian wants their mother to outlive them, must less outshine them, right? But that’s why we love Jamie Lee Curtis, and JLC’s old face that matches the drapes and red carpet of the human race’s most critiqued demographic: women. But there are some men’s surgery tales too.

But back to our movie list. This round-up is something we hope Jamie Lee will love to watch as much as we do. It’s electric and eclectic.

Top 10 Freaky Picks for Jamie Lee Curtis that Use Plastic Surgery in the Plot

1. THE SUBSTANCE [2024]
Plot Device: Holy Toledo Someone Bottled Drug Called Youth
Margaret Qualley eats up the scenery, but Demi Moore consumes her youth as a drug-induced phantom exchange of youth for fame comes from some freaky injection regimen. A MUST-WATCH, PS.

2. DEATH BECOMES HER [1992]
Plot Device: See Title, As In, Youth Addicted
Kookie Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn vie for eternal youth via magic surgery, a potion, for a campy elixir with very mixed results.

3. FACE/OFF [1997]
Plot Device: Hey, Plastic Surgery is the Plot: FBI agent John Travolta and schemer/terrorist Nicolas Cage face-swap via some futuristic-then (possible now) surgery, as they trigger-warn us about the evils of crime as they assume each other’s lives.

4. SECONDS [1996]
Plot Device: Man Exception to Rule Women Are Most Cut-up
In this John Frankenheimer vintage gem, a male middle-ager goes under the knife to the extreme that apes an earlier version of himself (to find out how that goes, watch this classic).

5. THE SKIN I LIVE IN [2011]
Plot Device: Director Pedro Almodóvar Medically Messes With Us Big Time
Antonio Banderas is a creepy plastic surgery MD who takes everything to the extreme, and you’ll have to forgive Pedro Almodóvar for going into the weeds here, as an auteur he has a point to make as always.

6. TIME [2006]
Plot Device: Obsessive Love Through Disguise
Korean Director Kim Ki-duk doesn’t care how much this movie freaks you out, even though it’s about a woman who gets a plastic surgery do-over to trick the world and her old boyfriend. See everything this man has ever made, as Ki-duk’s work in films is literally life-changing fare.

7. EYES WITHOUT A FACE [1960]
Plot Device: Don’t the French Do Everything Better Even Surgery
Uhm, this will be the film that makes you look at the topic of Plastic Surgery with fresh eyes, just kidding… a mad French cosmetic surgeon tries to help his mangled daughter with a new face.

8. DARK PASSAGE [1947]
Plot Device: Fugitive Undergoes Face Change to Hide From Big House
In this Bogey and Bacall hit, Humphrey Bogart is Vincent Parry whose mug gets a medical make-over on the lam from the law for a crime he didn’t commit, allegedly. Lauren Bacall helps hide bespoke-faced Bogart.

9. VANILLA SKY [2001]
Plot Device: We Get To See Tom Cruise’s Messed-Up Mug
Where to begin? This is not plain vanilla, but rather a sometimes dopey mix of colorful emotions in this film that tracks TC’s bad face to good face, while the likes of Penelope Cruz and Cameron Diaz make his life either hell or heaven, maybe not a hit?

10. GIRL MOST LIKELY TO… [1973]
Plot Device: Joan Rivers Co-Wrote This Nose-Job Revenge TV-Movie
This movie is seminal to the Plastic Surgery Canon of Films, however it lands at 10 due to the fact it is technically a “TV movie” which Joan Rivers co-wrote with Agnes Gallin. Powerhouse Stockard Channing, who will later play Pinkie in GREASE, takes it on the chin as an ugly duckling who goes medical swan.

Call JLC the only nepo Hollywood elder babe who made us love her so much that we forgot that she had famous parents. That said, JLC and co-star Lindsay Lohan, herself rebooted under a microscope in Hollywood, will share the split-screen again in this Disney sequel to Freaky Friday. Freakier Friday, open Aug. 8th, it’d be FOMO that makes you see it. We love you and your old face, Jamie Lee Curtis. Stay Age Positive.

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[Editor’s Note – welcome Chad Aiggia, Freelance Correspondent to your first bylined article for Screenmancer. Chad takes tips and scoops. Chad can be reached at news@screenmancer.tv.]

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