2024-01-10 00:47:00
The remake of the 2004 teen hit is up to date, free of the deliberately heavy jokes of its model. But thus sanitized and devoid of creativity, it boils down above all to a soothing politically correct display.
Terrible mission which is that of touching on the cult and satirical Mean Girls of 2004 by Mark Waters, translated Lolita despite me in France, this ideal teen-movie on the dawn of a new millennium bending under the reign of adolescent girls in search of recognition and ready to kill each other for the glory of looks and the ultimate prom tiara. The acerbic writing of the film with 130 million global entries in its popular contemporaneity unfolded so accurately that the object was declined in numerous viral memes, perpetual GIFs, punchlines revisited on signs in feminist demonstrations and other tributes (Ariana Grande, with her clip Thank U, Next).
The remake version of 2024 – Tina Fey, still writing the screenplay and in front of the camera in the role of the math teacher – has nevertheless given herself this bizarre mission to revive the contemporary patina of the story, motivation all the more more driven by the success between 2018 and 2020 of an adaptation of the film into a musical (also directed by the comedian) on the stages on Broadway, mowed down in mid-flight by the arrival of Covid. Mean Girls 2024 therefore tells the story almost exactly but with heavy music which this time, as if High School Musical had not been enough, the perilous evolution of a young white teenager, Cady (at the time, the unforgettable revelation Lindsay Lohan, now the Australian Angourie Rice) having lived a good part of her childhood in Africa, who must late acclimatize to the wildlife in full hormonal unleashing of an American school, all caught in a vice between a duo of friends on the fringes and the “Plastics”, a nickname given to these superficial girls who enforce their fashion morals among those who would like to join their ranks. Cady threatens to dethrone the hitherto undisputed queen of the group, even if it means leaving behind feathers and a good part of her childish soul.
Dubious physiognomonic jokes
We are faced with today’s Mean Girls as if we were facing a hollowed-out house that no longer makes sense. The frame still stands but the heart is no longer there. Under the guise of revisiting its former humor in a less problematic light (a worthy questioning), the film hardly seems convinced of what it does, even less of what it says, constantly monitoring its own deviations. ; the nastiness calms down, all the characters play empty (apart from the ultimate “mean girl” Regina George played with talent by the singer and actress Renée Rapp). So no more “sluts” of 2004 who were flying in all directions, the dubious physiognomonic jokes, as well as the clichéd outings about racialized people, those who are overweight, anorexics, drug addicts and so on… we understand. But what did the film deliberately want to make us laugh at if not also and above all by mirroring the cruel capacity of the most dominant being (often white Western) for crass stupidity and the narrow vision of everything that does not resemble him? By wanting to redo all this in a polite manner, with more diversity in the casting and boys making out in the background, Mean Girls 2024 only performs a surface lift, ticking all the boxes of political correctness instead of prospecting a new, caustic humor, in short, something that would have looked like real risk-taking.
Mean Girls, Lolita Despite Me by Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr., with Angourie Rice, Reneé Rapp, Tina Fey… 1h52
#Girls #Lolita #hits #foundation #Libération