Whether it be Christmas, Halloween, a regular ol’ Wednesday or even October 3rd, there’s never a non-fetch time to talk about the 2004 teen sensation Mean Girls. Born from the multi-talented comedic genius of Tina Fey, the film finds home-schooled “jungle geek” Cady Heron (a heyday Lindsay Lohan) infiltrating the bitchiest clique at her new school in order to bring them down from the inside. Dubbed The Plastic, the air-headed gang, lead by their fierce and devoutly ‘popular” over-ruler Regina George (a young Rachel McAdams), represent the very epitome of valley girl culture, and have since become infamous among 90s kids and beyond.
Although it’s very obviously true that Mean Girls doesn’t exactly constitute a Christmas film in the traditional sense, it does in fact contain an all-important festive sequence. Looking at the chosen shot, what may first appear to be four scantily-clad teenage girls in fact becomes something else entirely – a simultaneous celebration and satire of Hollywood’s innate desire to over-sex everything. As Cady and her fellow ‘plastic’ cohorts dance provocatively to Jingle Bell Rock (referring to themselves only as “Santa’s Helpers”), the one thing that becomes blindingly clear, and the key joke Fey is digging at with the scene, is that the whole debacle is so completely inappropriate. The innocence of Christmas and youth both tarnished by a rising culture of self-objectification.
Not exactly the most festive message I’m sure you’ll agree, but with it being wheeled-out by Fey and director Mark Waters in such a humorous manner, the key themes of the holiday still bleed through. Ultimately, it’s all about togetherness and, as the crowd start to sing along together and everyone begins to embrace the spirit of Christmas, Cady and the girls even realise themselves that their performance is as much about spreading festive cheer as it is about flaunting their bodies. Nothing like a good Christmas sing-a-long to remind us of our own humanity.
