Film: 
DVD: 
Written by Tina Fey, based on the book Queen Bees and Wannabes by Rosalind Wiseman
Directed by Mark Waters
Starring Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Tim Meadows, Lacey Chabert, Amanda Seyfried, Tina Fey, Neil Flynn, and Ana Gasteyer
Features:
- Running audio commentary with director Waters, scribe/actress Fey, and Producer Lorne Michaels
- Three featurettes: “Only the Strong Survive,” “The Politics of Girl World,” and “Plastic Fashion”
- Blooper reel
- Deleted scenes with audio commentary by Waters and Fey
- Three interstitials
Released by: Paramount Home Entertainment
Rating: PG-13
Region: 1
Anamorphic: Yes.
My Advice: Own it.
[ad#longpost]Cady (Lohan) is a new transfer student. She’s not quite ready for the world of high school politics. She’s been raised in the African bush country by her parents. She knows very little of American society let alone the dangers of surviving in an American high school. Upon her arrival, she is befriended by a goth and a gay who help ease the culture shock by informing her about the specifics of life in the American high school. Unfortunately, she is also being courted by the Plastics which are a clique of the most popular girls in school. Before she knows what’s going on, she’s placed in the middle of a high school Cold War. If she survives this, she can survive anything.
What a great movie. Fey has written a very funny screenplay and it was well directed. Of course, it had the touch of Lorne Michaels, but that didn’t seem to hurt it at all. It really didn’t feel like your typical Saturday Night Live-related Movie. Lohan is downright hilarious, sexy, innocent, and unscrupulous in all the right places. Her cohorts, the Plastics, headed up by McAdams, are outstanding. McAdams herself was almost upstaged by Chabert who had no problem at all chewing up the scenery with her dim-witted diva character.
The DVD itself is unusually good for a Paramount first-time release: in other words, there are actually some special features. The commentary track is exactly what you’d hope it would be. There’s just enough of Fey’s dry wit mixed with Michaels’ lack of wit and the director’s desire to actually talk about the movie at hand to make the whole thing work. I wish I could say the same thing about the featurettes. These are a big waste of time. Granted, there is a target audience for this movie, but they spent way too much time playing down to that audience with these featurettes. There is one that focuses on Fey’s adaptation of the movie and, while that’s a noteworthy event, it’s not nearly as noteworthy as they make it out to be. They treat her adaptation of the movie as though no other woman has ever adapted a screenplay in the history of Hollywood thus far. In other words, it’s a bit over the top. The deleted scenes are packaged very well. The one thing that becomes blatantly obvious is that they should have kicked Michaels out of the commentary track from the beginning. When you have Fey and Waters together alone, you get a poignant and enlightening, yet entertaining look at these scenes which would otherwise get lost in the world of the Typical Deleted Scenes on DVD.
The DVD’s saving grace is the gag reel. I’m a huge fan of these and this one is very well done. The only negative thing I can think to say about it is that it was too short. Just go ahead and buy the movie. The performances and the story alone make it worth the purchase.
