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Mean Girls Movie Analysis

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Mean Girls is a movie directed by Mark Waters that came out in 2004, based on the self-help book “Queen Bees and Wannabes” written in 2002 by Rosalind Wiseman. Cady, a 16 years old home-schooled single child of zoologist parents, has been living 12 years in Africa due to her parents’ research before returning to the United States. Since Cady was not used to high school life, Janis and Damien help her understand the various existing cliques, mostly the Plastics led by Regina George of which she is warned of. One day, the famous exclusive clique invites her to sit with them at lunch and then go shopping. Still having remorse towards Regina for humiliating her, Janis uses Cady to infiltrate the Plastics and rune Regina’s life. While hanging with the Plastics, Cady learns about the Burn Book filled with malicious rumors, secrets and gossip about people in school. Throughout classes, she falls in love with Regina’s ex-boyfriend, Aaron, which does not please to Regina who steals him back by humiliating Cady. Cady then continues Janis’s plan: making her life miserable by separating her couple, destroying her beauty, and turning her friends against her. Cady starts changing her personality becoming more as Regina without even realising: she starts failing math class to catch Aaron’s attention, she focuses on her physical appearance and abandons Janis and Damien – her true friends – only to fit in. To fight back, Regina puts herself in the Burn Book to exclude herself from its creators and spreads its content, creating a riot calmed by Principal Duvall. Ms. Norbury, which according to Cady’s rumor sold drugs, makes the girls realize that all of them are guilty of hurting their peers. Each girl confesses, and Regina learns about the Janis’s plan. Cady decides to take full blame for the Burn Book. She returns to her old personality and joins as consequence the Mathletes, described as "social suicide". The epiphanic moment occurs while competing against a very unattractive girl: she realises that even if she made fun of the girl's appearance it would not stop the girl from beating her. At the Spring Fling dance, Cady is elected Spring Fling Queen which she declares meaningless since each girl is wonderful in their own way

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