Although it may seem cliché to many, Mean Girls remains America’s classic ‘chick flicks,’ of all time. Cady Heron (Lindsay Lohan), moves to America from Africa and attends public school for the first time ever as a 16 year old high school student who is struggling to fit in; she learns very quickly about the psychological warfare of teenage girls in high school as well as to stay away from the “plastics,” – the popular girls – but it turns out to be harder for Cady than she thought it would be.

Directed by Mark Waters, Mean Girls – based on Rosalind Wiseman’s book Queen Bees and Wannabes - was released in 2004, and was quickly a hit; the casting of Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Lacey Chabert, Amanda Seyfried, and Jonathan Bennet was sure to make this movie extremely popular, very quickly. Basically, Mean Girls is a story of an outsider (Lindsay Lohan/ Cady) who goes to high school in America from Africa, her first time not being home schooled.  Throughout the movie, Cady struggles with making friends, sabotaging ‘The Plastics,’ or whether she should take the opportunity to become one of them herself.

On her first day of school, Cady meets her first friends that will stick with her throughout the entirety of the film – Janice Ian and Damian; the two tell Cady that they will show her the ropes, calling her ‘fresh meat’ her first day and making her maps of the school, as well as the social ladder.  While talking to Damian and Janice, ‘The Plastics’ catch Cady’s eye, but Damian and Janice are quick to warn Cady to stay away from them.  When Cady gets the exclusive opportunity to sit with ‘The Plastics’ at lunch, she takes it – not knowing what else to do. Throughout the movie, Cady struggles to either become one of ‘The Plastics,’ or to stick with Janice and Damian, the two people who are genuinely there for her throughout the whole film.

One very interesting scene in the film is one that takes place in the cafeteria of the school.  Cady is narrating, struggling to get along with the head of the Plastics, Regina George.  In this scene Cady says that she knows how something like this conflict would be handled in the animal world, relating her life now to that of her previous life in Africa.  In this scene, the director does a marvelous job and transitions into a “what if” scene about Cady and Regina turning animal like, roaring and growling at each other, crawling and jumping on the tables as a way to torment one another; then, Cady says it isn’t the animal world, it’s high school, and the director brings the scene back to what is actually happening.  This scene is very good because it draws a parallel to how high school can sometimes feel like a “survival of the fittest” situation, and how girls attack each other but do it very indirectly and psychologically.

Every high school girl should watch this movie. It would appeal mainly to teenage females, just because of the message.  Not only is it funny, and a little romantic, but it does have a very good background message.  Girls do not need to be so horrible to each other; they plot against each other and try to make others’ lives horrible, when in fact they should all be getting along and trying to help one another instead of tearing people around them down.  I would recommend this movie because the message, It is well-written, and very well directed.