Mean Movie
By Elton James Y. Gagni

A typical movie about girls getting eaten by their own insecurities; that is what Mean Girls is all about. One minute you’re best friends and the next thing you know, you’re worst enemies. Released on the 4th of May year 2004 and adapted from the book written by Rosalind Wiseman, Director Mark Waters gives us a movie that shows how a home-schooled girl becomes a plastic in the most twisted way. The story, plot and dialogues were pretty easy to understand since it was made to show the life of teenagers in a twisted way. I did not lose my interest while watching the movie for the simple reason that the presentation of the conflicts from one character to the next and how these conflicts would end up being tied together making one whole mess in the end. Although it was exaggeratedly presented, it was still believable because this shows one aspect of a girl’s life where she forms a group and gossip about how they hate people and would only dream of having such chaotic confrontation as that of the movie. As expected, the movie used many gender stereotypes especially on women since the movie title already implies of such. Unfortunately, it did not break any gender stereotype thus; it ended up taking those stereotypes to a whole new level. The director’s touch is obviously seen since the whole movie made use of close-ups, if not extreme close-ups, and a lot of point-of-view shots. These shots helped a lot to show character development especially on the character of Lindsay Lohan who transformed from an ordinary girl to a plastic. Given those shots, I say that they implied much gender stereotypes for women since they emphasized on the physical aspect of women; how they should and should not look, what is and what is not accepted, and pretty much everything that the word “vanity” can run over. Taking the director’s style into