Mean Girls
| Mean Girls | |
|---|---|
| File:Mean Girls movie.jpg | |
| Directed by | Mark Waters |
| Written by | Tina Fey (screenplay) Rosalind Wiseman (book) |
| Produced by | Lorne Michaels |
| Starring | Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Tina Fey, Amanda Seyfried |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
Release dates | April 19, 2004 (USA) |
Running time | 97 min. |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $17,000,000 |
Mean Girls is a 2004 film written by (and co-starring) Tina Fey. It stars Lindsay Lohan and featured several Saturday Night Live cast members, including Tim Meadows, Ana Gasteyer, and Amy Poehler. Its director, Mark Waters, younger brother of writer Daniel Waters, described the movie as Clueless meets Heathers [1], the latter of which was written by his brother. It was based on the non-fiction book Queen Bees and Wannabes (by Rosalind Wiseman), which describes how female middle school social cliques operate, and the effect they can have on girls. The movie was most likely set in high school instead of middle school to heighten the comedic exaggeration and have more appeal to young teens, who often follow (real or imagined) trends of older teens.
Plot
Tagline: Watch your back. Template:Spoiler
The movie is about Cady Heron (played by Lindsay Lohan) who moves to Evanston, Illinois, a Chicago suburb, after being raised in Africa by her zoologist parents.Cady's family moved there after her mother got a job at Northwestern University. The first friends she makes at her new school, North Shore High School, are two unpopular kids in "the outcrowd", who are unpopular because Damian is gay, and Janis, who is straight, is rumoured to be a lesbian. She later encounters The Plastics (Regina George, the Queen Bee, played by Rachel McAdams; Gretchen Weiners, played by Lacey Chabert; and Karen Smith, played by Amanda Seyfried) at her new school - three beautiful and popular girls who invite Cady to become their friend. Initially reluctant, Cady joins the group so she can learn their dark secrets at the behest of Damian and Janis. However, when Cady becomes infatuated with Regina's ex-boyfriend, Aaron Samuels (played by Jonathan Bennett), Regina takes revenge by taking him back. Cady, Damian, and Janis plot together to bring Regina down and remove her of her high social status.
Analysis
In an interview about the film, Fey noted, "Adults find it funny. They are the ones who are laughing. Young girls watch it like a reality show. It's much too close to their real experiences so they are not exactly guffawing" [2].
The role of Janis poked fun at many lesbian stereotypes. For example, the actress who played her, Lizzy Caplan, bore a strong resemblance to Nancy McKeon (McKeon's character on The Facts of Life, Jo Polniaczek, has been parodied in pop culture circles for the last twenty years as being the epitome of "butch dyke"). The character's full name is Janis Ian, a nod to the lesbian singer-songwriter of the same name. While it is hinted at many times during the film that Janis is a lesbian (when asked, she says that her ethnicity is Lebanese, a similar joke being used by Ellen Degeneres on her sitcom prior to her coming out of the closet), she is revealed to be unequivocally straight during the denouement, in which she apparently has a boyfriend, none other than star mathlete and amateur rapper Kevin Gnapoor.
Though the movie was inspired by the book Queen Bees and Wannabees by Rosalind Wiseman, another non-fiction book for teens, Mean Girls: Facing Your Beauty Turned Beast authored by Hayley DiMarco, was released at the same time as the movie. DiMarco had previously written Dateable: Are You? Are They? and is credited with creating the Biblezine concept while at Thomas Nelson Publishers. Characters and behaviors in the movie are based on Tina Fey's high school life at Upper Darby High School.
Cliques
In the film, the following cliques are mentioned:
- Freshmen
- ROTC Guys
- Preps
- J.V. (Junior Varsity) Jocks
- Asian Nerds (e.g. Tim Pak)
- Cool Asians (e.g. Trang Pak)
- Varsity Jocks (e.g. Jason)
- Unfriendly Black Hotties
- Girls Who Eat Their Feelings (overweight/obese)
- Girls Who Don't Eat Anything (anorexic)
- Desperate Wannabes
- Burnouts
- Sexually Active Band Geeks
- Asexual Band Geeks
- The Greatest People You'll Ever Meet a.k.a. Art Freaks (e.g. Janis & Damian)
- ...and the worst. "Beware of the Plastics" (Regina George, Karen Smith, Gretchen Wieners)
Each clique has their own cafeteria fracture table, as seen in a montage narrated by Janis.
Trivia
- Film grossed $86,058,055 in the United States, making it Lindsay Lohan's 2nd biggest film.
- During the gymnasium confessional, Tim Meadows says "Who has a lady problem that they'd like to talk about?", a reference to his character "Leon Phelps" on SNL.
- Amy Poehler (Mrs. George) is only five years older than Rachel McAdams (Regina).
- Rachel McAdams is ten years older than Lindsay Lohan.
- Rachel McAdams wears a blond wig in this movie, as revealed by the director and the writer in the DVD commentary. Her usual hair color is dark brown.
- This became Lohan's first non-Disney movie of any kind.
- Lacey Chabert was the only choice for the role of Gretchen.
- Tina Fey admits that she was drawn to Jonathan Bennett to play Aaron Samuels because of his strong resemblance to her Saturday Night Live castmate Jimmy Fallon.
- Amanda Seyfried, who plays Karen in the film, originally auditioned for the role of Regina, but producer Lorne Michaels felt she may be better suited for "the dumb one."
- Tim Meadows broke his wrist prior to shooting the movie, so Mr. Duvall's carpal tunnel syndrome had to be written into the script.
- This movie is listed as Mariah Carey's favorite movie on her website.
- A poster of Carey's single "Can't Take That Away (Mariah's Theme)" is on Damian's wall in a scene.
- The term "fetch" has caught on out of irony, as a sarcastic criticism of new trends [3]
- The film takes place in Evanston, Illinois, but was filmed in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
- The final question to decide the State Math Championship is easily evaluated by applying L'Hôpital's rule, yielding a result of negative infinity.
- Regina means "Queen" in latin, most likely because Regina is the "Queen Bee".
See also
External links
