Mean Girls

For every generation of teenagers, there seems to be one defining high school film outlining the peer hierarchies and social struggles of the time: for the 80s, this was Heathers, the 90s had Clueless, in 2004 we got Mean Girls and now, 20 years later it’s… Mean Girls, again?

Written by Tina Fey and directed by Mark Waters, the endlessly quotable hit film inspired a Broadway musical (for which Fey’s husband Jeff Richmond wrote the music), and this has been adapted back into a film, co-directed in a debut by Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. Inexplicable choices like this, unfortunately, stretch across the film as well.

The story remains the same: previously homeschooled in an African country, teenage Cady Heron’s transfer to a US-American high school amplifies her “fish out of water” by placing it into a shark tank. Luckily the queer peanut gallery, consisting of Janis and Damian, are willing to adopt her into their circle and teach her the ropes of navigating the hazardous territory of cliques and bullies. However, Cady also catches the eye of the apex predator of the school, Regina George, and the opportunity to become one of the popular girls is too tempting to resist.

The star of this film is Renée Rapp, whose alluring charisma is enough to make her a credible Regina; the promo makes no pretence of the alleged main character being at the centre. This stands in stark contrast to how the story is built up: the script works through Cady and her perspective, yet the film seems entirely uninterested in her and Angourie Rice cannot match Lindsay Lohan’s adaptability, who bounced so naturally between nice girl and drama queen. The majority of the jokes are ripped straight from the 2004 film, and while they may still work in an umpteenth rewatch thereof, in this setting, with anything potentially triggering defused, most of them don’t hit. What is the point of turning Coach Carr into a legitimate object of desire by casting the ultimate Zaddy, Jon Hamm, when the whole storyline of students fighting over him is discarded and there are perhaps three shots of him throughout the film (all of which are in the trailer)? In fact, the entirety of the brilliant adult cast is a case of good iron wasted to make nails, as the comedic talents of Busy Philipps and Jenna Fisher, who play Regina and Cady’s respective mothers, are equally underused.

The songs that protract the film into unnecessary length are barely memorable at best and outright uncomfortable to endure at worst. There is a stretch of maybe 20 minutes, where the movie presents novel ideas (cue: the Halloween Party) and first turns genuinely funny through a quirky musical number, before exploring imaginative elements of dramatic composition, but this is not enough to accelerate a feature that anxiously drives with its handbrake firmly on.

Diehard fans of the franchise will go see the movie regardless, but perhaps Mean Girls (2024) is best enjoyed by those unfamiliar with any of the previous material.

Selina Sondermann

Mean Girls is released nationwide on 17^th January 2024.

Watch the trailer for Mean Girls here: