Going through school is a trying test at the best of times, but what about when you’ve never been to school before and are faced with the meanest group of girls your mind could ever comprehend?
Mean Girls is a film retelling the story from the 2004 movie of the same name and the Broadway stage show, coming to the West End this year. The movie follows Cady Heron, a home-schooled teen who finds herself entering high school for the first time, to be confronted with the popular ‘Plastics’ – Karen Shetty, Gretchen Wieners and their fearsome leader Regina George. After being exposed to Regina’s duplicitous ways, Cady sets out to destroy the queen bee, but the girls’ Burn Book will make their lives much harder than any of them could have imagined.
I’ve seen a range of opinions and thoughts on this adaptation, ranging from the very good to the very bad. And my own perspective is likely to be a rare one, in that this was my very first exposure to Mean Girls, having never seen the original film, show or heard the soundtrack. Now that I’ve had the experience of this story and this music, the only word I can possibly think of to describe my feelings towards this is indifferent. The film wasn’t bad by any means, but it wasn’t good either. It felt very much like a film to be put on in the background whilst you do the housework or tidy up, not one to relax in front of. The portrayals of the characters were mostly convincing, the story was similar to others I’ve seen before and the soundtrack was unremarkable, besides a few key numbers such as ‘Apex Predator’. The film just felt very dull and I was ready for it to end when the credits started to play.
Bebe Wood as Gretchen Wieners was my surprising favourite performance in this film, with her touching and convincing portrayal of this second-in-command, vulnerable figure whose only job is to serve Regina George. Her emotion and deep connection to this character was a bright shining light throughout the film, and I was often more excited to see her on screen than her more principal counterparts. Speaking of Regina, Reneé Rapp gave a scary showing as the aforementioned antihero, with her commanding presence clearly weighing on the entire school throughout. She is clearly a manifestation of every popular person in school who devoted their lives to making everyone else’s worse and she does this quite convincingly.
Mean Girls is a film that does everything it said it would and very little more. I left the film understanding the story and the characters, but not in a way that gets me excited to revisit the story. The film was okay as films go, but as a movie musical, left a lot to be desired.
Rating: ★★☆☆☆
Mean Girls was released in U.K. cinemas on January 19th
