Reimagining any beloved piece of media is a dangerous road to follow. An inherent set of unwritten rules is required for success; it must be autonomous without feeling like a cookie-cutter copy and it must stay loyal to its origins. The “Mean Girls” Broadway production, based on the 2004 comedy classic, adapted its source material for a separate medium with a musical flourish. With a modernized 2024 remake, the franchise aims to achieve the best of both worlds.
Despite some entertaining musical sequences, the “Mean Girls” remake falls flat. Its artificial visuals, barebones comedy and atrocious pacing make for a hollow experience.
Like its predecessors, the film follows new student Cady Heron (Angourie Rice) and her quest to acclimate with the school royalty trio, “The Plastics,” ruled by Regina George (Reneé Rapp). When Cady falls for Regina’s ex-flame, she becomes The Plastic’s prey. With the help of her outcast friends, Janis and Damian (Auli’i Carvalho and Jaquel Spivey), she plots to topple Regina, hoping to stay true to herself in a cutthroat environment.
Despite representing the antithesis of originality, the film’s “remake” identity isn’t the central issue. I’m not opposed to remakes or adaptations; whether they stay faithful to their source material or divert, quality and improvement remain viable. The issue is a lack of personality. The raunchy comedy engrained in the original film’s legacy is almost entirely absent, and the smattering of reused jokes don’t hit as hard without their original context. An occasional chuckle doesn’t negate the core problem: the film isn’t very funny.
The clear focus is the music, which swallows up much of the film’s runtime. For the most part, I thought the musical sequences were executed well. The showy choreography and glitzy visual magnetism of songs like “Sexy” and “Revenge Party” were lively and enjoyable. Despite its gems, the film is discernibly overstuffed with numbers. So much of the exposition is delivered via song that it interrupts time for organic character interaction or jokes. I could appreciate this structure on stage, but it feels awkward on screen.
As a result, the pacing suffers significantly. Cady’s evolving dynamics with her friends and foes aren’t fleshed out in the slightest. The plot aims to hit each beat of the original but doesn’t give the characters as much time to interact. Everything is spat out rapidly to make space for the drawn-out musical exposition dumps. It’s rightfully extravagant and theatrical but leaves the characters feeling like pawns in an unfocused story.
Rice’s performance is fine, but I couldn’t resonate with Cady’s complicated journey or hilarious home-schooled naivety like I could in the original. Rapp is good, but her performance pales compared to Rachel McAdams’s devilish, over-dramatic edge that made Regina George so iconic. Among a forgettable lineup of supporting performances, I enjoyed Carvalho and Spivey’s the most.
Visually, “Mean Girls” is largely uninspired. I enjoyed some of the fluid camerawork utilized in certain sequences, which added to the success of the musical portions of the film. Outside of the tunes, the vibrancy is lost. The high school environment felt drastically less realized than the original — a vital aspect of that film’s comedic tone.
At the end of the day, there’s something uniquely 2000s about the original film that can’t be translated into a mega-Gen Z, underwritten adaptation. “Mean Girls” is a decent compilation of musical clips but an unfunny, underwhelming film.
