Mean Girls (2004)

_Mean Girls_ has absolutely no business being as phenomenal as it is. None at all. If you've read many enough my reviews to get any sort of indication as to the sort of cinema I am in to, then you could be forgiven for assuming I wouldn't be a fan. After all, _Mean Girls_ is about as far away from my wheelhouse as a movie could conceivably be. But I fucking **love** it. And I honestly can't tell you why. Every single piece of _Mean Girls_ examined in isolation, is something I despise. Every trope, formula, format, cliche, device and style choice is something I have ragged on a hundred times before in different reviews, but for whatever reason, I cannot put _Mean Girls_ down. I don't think a single year has gone by since I first saw it in the late '00s that I haven't rewatched it. Usually, multiple times a year. Inexplicable, but there it is.
_Final rating:★★★★½ - Ridiculously strong appeal. I can’t stop thinking about it._

"Cady" (Lindsay Lohan) has spent much of her life being home schooled by her scientist parents in the African wilderness. Maybe that ought to have prepared her for her relocation to an American High School where the dog eat dog attitude is just as prevalent. She alights on the two school oddballs - "Janis" (Lizzy Caplan) and her "almost too gay to function" pal "Damian" (Daniel Franzese) who guide her through the tribes of people at the school. The ones to be avoided at all costs are the "Plastics" - vain and vacuous girls led by "Regina" (Rachel McAdams). When "Cady" is invited to join them for lunch one day, they all sense a chance for some mischief-making! She happens to sit behind the school heart-throb "Aaron" (Jonathan Bennett) who seems as keen on her as she on him, but wait! He is the ex of her new found bff. Is he off limits or maybe "Regina" could even help her courtship? Well the scene is now set for an acerbically satirical look at all things teenage. There's angst a-plenty, vengeance, revenge, a thoroughly enjoyable degree of bitchiness and by mid way through it's quite hard to pick any of them to rescue from an earthquake. Lohan and McAdams are in their element her and Tina Fey's adaptation of Rosalind Wiseman's sarcasm-ridden novel swipes at just about everyone from the geeks to the jocks, the bimbos to the brainiacs. There are elements of stereotyping, but put together in this melting pot of attitude and aptitude, they work to serve up an entertaining look at an environment where hormones are raging and being popular is essential - however many people you have to tread upon, cruelly if required, to attain status. It's exaggerated, sure, but there's something real about the whole thing that adds to it's realism and there's even a bit of the real Janis Ian ("At 17") for the eagle-eared to hear, too. Good fun.