New student Cady Heron gets welcomed into the top of the social food chain by an elite group of popular girls called the Plastics, ruled by the conniving queen bee Regina George. However, when Cady makes the major misstep of falling for Regina's ex-boyfriend, she soon finds herself caught in their crosshairs.
Mean Girls (2024) is directed by Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. which is both of their directorial debut. The movie is based on the Broadway musical of the same name which is based on Mark Waters's Mean Girls (2004).
It should go without saying that Mean Girls (2004) has built a massive following over the years, it's a hilarious movie that still holds up today and is a prime example of high school film done right. I can't comment on the quality of the Broadway show since I haven't seen it, but it's worth mentioning I know some people who liked it and others who did not. Despite the trailers not being very good for Mean Girls (2024) the movie itself is actually not bad, it definitely is heavily flawed which we will get into why. But I was decently surprised of how it turned out
For starters, I'm sure this has been repeated countless times in other reviews but it needs to be said how excellent Reneé Rapp really is as Regina George. Almost immediately when she enters the movie she completely captures what made Rachel McAdams's portrayal so great, she puts in this natural feel that is striking, genuinely funny and has beautiful as well as exciting screen presence. Rapp captured this more modern Regina George while also having the spirit of the original, it's truly great to see and definitely think Rapp's performance is one of the highlights of the movie.
Auli'l Cravalho as Janis is quite great as well, while the script doesn't change her character that much Cravalho is able to make it work with her acting which is quite great. Tim Meadows and Tina Fey reprise their roles from the original, both of which are quite great, they do the same sort of thing they did in the original movie but it's nice to see them back.
The musical element of the movie is pretty great especially combined with the choreography and each of the songs matching the tone of each of the scenes, granted I don't think any of the songs hit it out of the park. But they are fun to watch and are quite entertaining in their own right. Once again Reneé Rapp truly shines here.
Honestly the major problem here is the movie heavily relies on the original, it reuses a lot of the same scenes, same dialogue and even same jokes. While it is nice to see some of those iconic scenes and moments again, it does feel a bit cheap like the movie is holding back from doing something different. It's a bit frustrating because that really does not give you a whole lot to comment on, sure there are a few moments where the movie does make certain scenes it's own by putting it's own twist on it. But it's not enough to really say that the movie is much different from the original.
Despite that however I do think Mean Girls (2024) is decently fun, I'm sure this will go on to be somewhat of a cult hit especially by younger audiences. It's a great time that I do think could have been better.
Mean Girls (2024) is playing in theaters.
6/10 C+
No comments:
Post a Comment