Minor Spoilers Ahead, watch out! This would've been a good movie if it had gone for utter farce and didn't try to so overtly deliver a moral, which ironically would've gotten the point across.
Now I'm going to assume by the language and content that this movie was written for mid-teens. High-schoolers. However, the way it's delivered treats its audience like children that need to be walked from one idea to another. Instead of potentially coming to the conclusions the movie advocates ourselves, we're hand-held through some sloppy voiceovers from Cady Heron, the lead character played by Lindsay Lohan. The whole point of the movie is that these so-called "plastics" live pointless, hollow lives, thriving merely off the failures of others. This is extremely clear already, and doesn't need to be spelled out for us.
While I'm on the subject of theme, I'd also like to address some of the hypocrisy this movie demonstrates. Going into it, one expects that this will attempt to demonize the clique nature of high school culture. Instead, it promotes it. All conflict in this movie comes from cliques clashing, and the happy resolution has the characters disassociate from each other into their own cliques. The only thing this film does is address problem cliques, like the "skank army" led by Rachel McAdams' Regina George, ensuring that with their destruction, the other cliques can live in peace. It's a wasted opportunity, if nothing else, that could've showcased just how ridiculous clique systems are.
And then of course there's the blatant shallowness, disguised as marketing. The lead is the attractive (I think we can all agree) Lindsay Lohan, and while she's befriended by the average-looking Janis and Damien, they end up playing very minor roles. Instead, we're bombarded with beautiful people for the majority of the film. Beautiful Cady pursues hunky Aaron despite the machinations of pretty Regina. And even when Cady tricks Regina into gaining weight which makes her apparently lose her "hot body," she still looks amazing. A couple of overweight students are thrown in so that Cady can, in the profound conclusion, assure us that you can still be beautiful without being a supermodel, but the film ignores these characters just as much as the Mean Girls it vilifies do.
Why does Cady have to desire the typical teenage heart-throb over, say, the quirky but kind-hearted Damien? Why can't Janis be happily homosexual? Or at least ambiguous? Why does the film have to assure us, at the end, that she IS, in fact, straight? Why must every fat person persist to be a sponge for comedic abuse instead of an actual character? Why couldn't any of the pretty girls realize that being pretty doesn't (or, at least, shouldn't) matter and stop putting so much effort into it? What seems to be an effort to break down preconceptions ends up reinforcing all the stereotypes we've seen before.
If you don't want to look into it, it's entertaining enough. Many of the jokes are rather obvious, but it has its moments, particularly Rachel McAdams getting suddenly hit by a school bus during a heated confrontation with Lindsay Lohan. Watching it, I was thinking to myself, "Man, arguing in the road? Someone better get hit by a bus," and lo and behold, BAM. I laughed extensively, and my vote would've been lower without it.
Now I'm going to assume by the language and content that this movie was written for mid-teens. High-schoolers. However, the way it's delivered treats its audience like children that need to be walked from one idea to another. Instead of potentially coming to the conclusions the movie advocates ourselves, we're hand-held through some sloppy voiceovers from Cady Heron, the lead character played by Lindsay Lohan. The whole point of the movie is that these so-called "plastics" live pointless, hollow lives, thriving merely off the failures of others. This is extremely clear already, and doesn't need to be spelled out for us.
While I'm on the subject of theme, I'd also like to address some of the hypocrisy this movie demonstrates. Going into it, one expects that this will attempt to demonize the clique nature of high school culture. Instead, it promotes it. All conflict in this movie comes from cliques clashing, and the happy resolution has the characters disassociate from each other into their own cliques. The only thing this film does is address problem cliques, like the "skank army" led by Rachel McAdams' Regina George, ensuring that with their destruction, the other cliques can live in peace. It's a wasted opportunity, if nothing else, that could've showcased just how ridiculous clique systems are.
And then of course there's the blatant shallowness, disguised as marketing. The lead is the attractive (I think we can all agree) Lindsay Lohan, and while she's befriended by the average-looking Janis and Damien, they end up playing very minor roles. Instead, we're bombarded with beautiful people for the majority of the film. Beautiful Cady pursues hunky Aaron despite the machinations of pretty Regina. And even when Cady tricks Regina into gaining weight which makes her apparently lose her "hot body," she still looks amazing. A couple of overweight students are thrown in so that Cady can, in the profound conclusion, assure us that you can still be beautiful without being a supermodel, but the film ignores these characters just as much as the Mean Girls it vilifies do.
Why does Cady have to desire the typical teenage heart-throb over, say, the quirky but kind-hearted Damien? Why can't Janis be happily homosexual? Or at least ambiguous? Why does the film have to assure us, at the end, that she IS, in fact, straight? Why must every fat person persist to be a sponge for comedic abuse instead of an actual character? Why couldn't any of the pretty girls realize that being pretty doesn't (or, at least, shouldn't) matter and stop putting so much effort into it? What seems to be an effort to break down preconceptions ends up reinforcing all the stereotypes we've seen before.
If you don't want to look into it, it's entertaining enough. Many of the jokes are rather obvious, but it has its moments, particularly Rachel McAdams getting suddenly hit by a school bus during a heated confrontation with Lindsay Lohan. Watching it, I was thinking to myself, "Man, arguing in the road? Someone better get hit by a bus," and lo and behold, BAM. I laughed extensively, and my vote would've been lower without it.