ALARIS' REVIEWS

12th June 2008
Mean Girls (2004)

I actually had no particular intention of watching Mean Girls until someone told me that Tina Fey (30 Rock) had been involved in writing it. I generally don't have a huge interest in high school movies that don't have rousing speeches about "Captain, my Captain", especially if the movie telegraphs that it's about cliques of mean girls. I'm wary of movies that sound potentially more painful than they are entertaining.

However, Mean Girls is smart, quirky, and funny, with bucketloads of positive messages. It's high school satire with heart, minimal skank, zilch frat boy pratfalls, and I loved the thread of academic humour - how many movies can boast a score with "The Mathletes' Rap" on it?

The wryly comic tone of the movie reminded me in parts of the animated TV series Daria, but Mean Girls is far less cynical. It's a highly predictable Hollywood movie, which follows a comforting, archetypal arc, but it's done well, with equal measure of humour and optimism.

Standouts were Lizzy Caplan, who did an awesome job as the main character's outcast friend, Janis, and Tina Fey, who played the maths teacher, Ms Norbury. Actually, Tina Fey more or less played Tina Fey, but her opinionated, self deprecatory, left leaning characters always make me want to jump up and yell "You tell 'em!"

Mean Girls was watchable from beginning to end, with a lot more quirkiness than the ads would have you believe.

Verdict: A smart, fun, high school movie, if you don't mind the predictability and the determined optimism. I certainly didn't.

If you liked Daria, but you can let go of a little cynicism, you might like this.

Read Clementine's review of Mean Girls (2004).