Sixteen-year-old Cady returns to the United States after growing up in Kenya, where her single mother raised her. Hence the teenager’s absolute disorientation when she sets foot in her new secondary school, of which she is unaware of the morals, the codes and, above all, the cliques. After two misfits, Janis and Damian, took her under their wing, Cady is drawn into the fold of Regina, the beautiful and terrible queen of the “Plastics”, a band that dominates all the others. Manipulations, betrayals, reconciliations and important lessons follow. Adaptation of the 2017 musical show from the 2004 film, Mean Girls (Nasty teens) offers colorful overflows of cruelty.
Screenwriter of the first film, Tina Fey is back in her role (and in the role of the mathematics teacher, Mrs. Norbury). Note that there was, originally, a guide by Rosalind Wiseman intended for parents of teenage girls, adapted very freely by Fey, who was mainly inspired by her own teenage experiences. Cady is his creation, as are Regina and her friends, Karen and Gretchen.
The designer of the brilliant satirical series 30 Rock has imagined a host of embarrassing situations, deadly replies, and improbable neologisms: impossible to forget Gretchen who tries in vain to popularize the word ” fetch » (meaning “nice”, “excellent”, or “ bed ”, to use a more recent teen neologism).
Apart from all this, what distinguishes Mean Girls, all iterations combined, from the very copious lot of school comedies is precisely the focus on young girls inherited from Wiseman’s book. Of course, we recognize certain motifs and figures dear to the genre.
20 years ago, Mean Girls knew how to rehash these major themes in his own way (need to belong, peer pressure, bullying, etc.) by focusing precisely on the dynamics of the cliques that make high school a paradise or a hell, depending on which one we belong. So Cady seizes the opportunity to become popular by believing she can remain herself.
However, in doing so, she will compromise not only her identity, but also her values.
Fluidity of numbers
On this level, it must be said, Mean Girls, all versions combined again, has a slightly moralizing tone. The approach is also a little too explicitly educational (Ms. Norbury literally explains the moral of the story to the students).
In this regard, films like Eighth Gradeby Bo Burnham, Booksmart (First class), by Olivia Wilde, and especially Bottomsby Emma Seligman, show more subtlety in the way they address their target audience.
The 2024 vintage of Mean Girls doesn’t allow itself to be looked at any less with pleasure. Not all of the songs are memorable, but several have their effect. We think of Meet the Plasticsespecially.
The numbers, on the other hand, are all staged with fluidity and dynamism, without downtime. Co-directors Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. are especially imaginative with Someone Gets Hurta campy moment during a private party.
In the role of Cady, previously immortalized by Lindsay Lohan (who comes to say hello), Angourie Rice convinces more in the first part, as a studious student who discovers a new world, than in the second, as a clone of her rival Regina. In this score which once revealed Rachel McAdams, Reneé Rapp completely eclipses her partner.
This imbalance of power between the protagonist and the antagonist is arguably consistent with what would occur in real life, high school being what it is, generation after generation. However, in the context of the film, it is not very winning, or even not very fetch.