Dubord 1 Kierstin Dubord Mr.

Newman English 101: Rhetoric 16 October 2013 Everybody Loves the Mean Girls Who says all teenage movies have to be cheesy and clich? In 2004, Mark S. Waters directed a teenage flick even their parents would love. Mean Girls is essentially a movie about High School domination and revenge. When Cady Heron (Lindsey Lohan) moves from Africa to the States, her new friends Janis (Lizzy Coplan) and Damien (Daniel Franzese) use Cadys innocence to get inside the most popular group in school, The Plastics. Once Cady is in the Plastics, drama unfolds and the revenge starts on the head of The Plastics, Regina George (Rachel McAdams). Roger Ebert and Ann Hornaday both reviewed Mean Girls and had nothing but great things to say. While they both discuss the cast of the film, Ebert writes more about the makers of the movie, whereas Hornaday writes more about specific scenes from the movie. A big part of both reviews was their discussions of the cast. Hornaday says the film is "well-acted and visually lively". Lohan, the movie's lead role, was able to "retain the audience's sympathy" even though "she seems in danger of going native" (Hornaday). Lohan wasn't the only one with good acting though, Hornaday says the supporting cast was "equally on its game here" with each one of them bringing something good to the table to make the movie great. Ebert says Lohan "never allows the character to tilt into caricature" and because of this she makes her character believable. Even The Plastics seem real, making the movie very relatable (Ebert). The cast was able to connect to each other and bring out the vision Fey and Waters had for the film. Overall, Ebert and Hornaday agree the cast made the movie great.

Dubord 2 Even though they both discuss the cast of the movie, Ebert spends more time writing about the makers of the movie than Hornaday does. Right after the plot summary of the movie, Ebert talks about Tina Fey, the screenplay writer for Mean Girls. He describes the screenplay as a "cosmic and sociological achievement" which can all be thanks to Tina Fey (Ebert). Another thing Ebert says about the screenplay is that Fey was able to utilize comedy as a learning tool, since the parents in the movie were of no help to the teenage drama going on (Ebert). Ebert also discusses the director of the movie, Mark S. Waters. Although he writes more about Tina Fey he still mentions other movies Waters has directed, which he praises all those movies, too. We can infer here that Ebert thinks Waters is a respectable director. Hornaday, too, mentions the makers of the movie, but that is all she merely does is mention them. Hornaday says, "Mean Girls zips along propelled by Fey's steady stream of one-liners and Waters's visual style" (Hornaday). We can infer from this quote that Hornaday enjoys the movie and agrees with Ebert that Fey and Waters did a wonderful job creating this comedy. Hornaday got her opinion out in one sentence while Ebert felt he needed to elaborate a little more. Another dissimilarity between the two reviews is that Hornaday focuses more on specific scenes from the movie whereas Ebert does not write about scenes from the movie at all. One thing Hornaday discusses that Ebert does not is the jungle scenes that happen in the movie. The director purposefully implements "voice overs pondering the similarities of high school to the jungle" to connect Cady's life in Africa to here in the states (Hornaday). The scene in particular that Hornaday tells the readers about is the mall scene when the fountain becomes an African watering hole and the actors start acting like wild animals out of the jungle (Hornaday). In Ebert's review he does not mention this scene, but it's an important scene because this is how Cady makes everything in the film click. The whole movie is about connecting high school

Dubord 3 cliques to that of wild animals in Africa, so it's an important point to include in the review. The drama of high school girls is alleviated in Mean Girls through Fey's sense of humor writing the screenplay and Waters's visual style of directing. Hornaday and Ebert both give Mean Girls a thumbs up which can be shown in their reviews of the movie. While they both differ some in content, both reviews make it very obvious that they loved the movie and the makers behind such a superb production. I think it's safe to say that with such great reviews of the movie, Mean Girls just might become the new family favorite.

Dubord 4 Works Cited Ebert, Roger. "Mean Girls." Roger Ebert. 30 Apr. 2004. Web. 7 Oct. 2013. Hornaday, Ann. "Comedy That Cliques." Washington Post 30 Apr. 2004: Web. 7 Oct. 2013.

Purpose (25): Successful (A+ thru B):

Demonstrates a superior understanding of two critics reviews of the same film and shows how they agree and differ about various aspects of said film Utilizes point-by-point or block format effectively in the analysis

Genre (25): Successful (A+ thru B): Contains a thesis in the last sentence of the intro that effectively captures the areas that are being compared and contrasted. Demonstrates a sophisticated evaluation of the films regarding the aspects chosen for analysis

Design/Layout (25): Successful (A+ thru B): Uses a 12-point, Times New Roman font with a double-spaced page Includes a creative title, appropriately placed and formatted headers, heading, and page numbers A Works Cited list is included on its own page at the end that includes both reviews and possibly the film

Audience (25): Successful (A+ thru B): Uses vocabulary, grammar, spelling, and usage appropriate for a college audience Assumes a level of intelligence and sophistication for the audience Offers an intriguing mix of comparisons and contrasts in an intellectual way

Stance (25): Successful (A+ thru B): Demonstrates an understanding of each critics stance through textual support

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Includes a consistent tone that presents the critics reviews fairly