Mean Girls is a teen angst film that focuses on Cady, a home-schooled teenager who goes to public school for the first time, as she attempts to make friends and adjust to being in a school. She becomes friends with two art students – Janis and Damian – who warn her to stay away from the “plastics”, the popular girls that are led by Janis’s enemy, Regina George. Regina invites Cady to sit with the plastics at lunch times and Janis uses this to her advantage by making her ruin Regina’s popularity. Cady agrees to the plan because she thinks that getting rid of Regina will allow her to date Regina’s ex-boyfriend, Aaron, but ends up becoming the new leader of the plastics. This leads to her falling out with Janis, Aaron admitting that he preferred her before she turned plastic, getting bad name throughout the school, and “pushing” Regina in front of a bus. The film ends on a prom in which Cady wins prom queen and makes an apologetic speech to her peers, restoring all of her friendships.
The main protagonist, Cady, is
constantly portrayed as being out of place in a school and tells the
audience this through her narrative of the film that will sometimes
relate her current situation to how animals used to act when she was
in Africa. She is very good at maths – which is shown as not
stereotypical by her being the only girl in her school’s maths team
– but she isn’t very talented at socialising and this leads to
many of the problems in the film.
Regina is a stereotypical teenage
girl who is spoilt and likes clothes, boys and talking to her
friends. Although she is meant to represent the “popular” girl
that every school has, her character is exaggerated to make the film
more interesting for the audience. An example of this is her first
appearance where she is carried in by her classmates and this
emphasises how much the other students love her but also shows that
she has power over them and they wouldn’t want to face the
consequences of if they didn’t keep her happy.
The other plastics – Gretchen and
Karen – are also stereotypical teenagers and are portrayed as only
being Regina’s friends because they are air-headed and will agree
to anything Regina says. Karen is portrayed as being dumb and is
repeatedly told to “shut up”, while Gretchen is smarter but
scared of Regina. The three of them wear pink frequently throughout
the film which is a typical girl colour and enforces their stereotype
of being girly and fashion conscious.
This scene
shows the main characters in a school cafeteria which is relatable as
the target audience is teenage girls. The three plastics are on one
side of the table with Regina in the middle to show that she’s the
leader of them, and they are all facing towards Cady which makes her
seem lonely and exposed in front of them – this is further
emphasised by the high-key lighting that makes the place appear more
open. The mid-shot allows the audience to see all of the characters
while also keeping the busy cafeteria in the background, which adds
to the realism of the film. They are all wearing casual but
fashionable clothes and makeup which is typical of girls their age
and shows that their appearance is important to them.
In this scene, the girls are in the
mall and gossiping about their fellow classmates which is a very
stereotypical thing for teenagers to do outside of school. They are
all interested in what Regina has to say – emphasising her role as
queen bee – but Cady’s body language shows that she is
uncomfortable; her clothing also connotes that she doesn’t really
fit in as she is the only one in jeans rather than a skirt and her
outfit isn’t as fashionable as the others’.
The main settings for the film are a
high school, a mall and the character’s houses, and these make it
seem realistic and relatable as the teenage audience will spend most
of their time with their friends inside or outside school.
