Every Elmore Leonard Adaptation Ranked Worst To Best

In 2013, Elmore Leonard’s 1988 novel “Freaky Deaky” was adapted for the big screen as a daring black comedy. From indie director Charles Matthau, it features a batch of oddball actors that perfectly fit Leonard’s style, including Christian Slater, Billy Burke, Crispin Glover, Andy Dick, Michael Jai White, and Bill Duke. Set in the 1970s, it tells the story of a former Detroit bomb squad cop (Burke) who turns to a life of crime.

Despite the book being set in the ’80s, Matthau moves the action to the more stylish and Leonard-like 1970s, where a disgraced cop and explosives expert joins up with Greta (Sabina Gadecki), an aspiring actor, and a group of would-be revolutionaries who want to get revenge against a powerful but eccentric movie producer (Glover). With the help of a small-time crook named Skip (Slater), this rag-tag gang finds themselves in a series of deadly double crosses, dangerous liaisons, and plenty of sex, lies, and idiot takes.

The movie’s camp is a little over the top, and the plot is overly complicated, but it’s a fun, fast-paced, tongue-in-cheek crime comedy that lives up to the spirit of Leonard’s works, even if it isn’t quite the original story he had in mind.