Recollections: Mean Girls

I'm sure you've been seeing and reading a lot about Mean Girls this, the week of its tenth anniversary, so here's one last article to end your Mean Week.

Realizing that it's been ten years since Mean Girls sends me into a time warp. Has it really been ten years since I was in grade nine?! And, has a movie really stayed in the pop-culture vernacular for ten years straight?! Such is the power of Mean Girls. I honestly feel sorry for teenagers today who don't get to experience fresh and new Mean Girls in their high school years. (Although, I bet older people say that about my generation and Clueless or John Hughes movies.) My school actually sent all the girls to see Mean Girls in theatres, to teach us a lesson, I guess. I'm pretty sure I came out of it wondering how everyone was classifying everyone else into their cliques. "So, like, who are The Plastics of our school?" "Oh my god, those are the weird art kids." "There's the jocks." But, I've always been judgmental, so maybe it was just me.

I feel so lucky to have been just the right age for this movie and be a part of the Mean Girls generation. Ya, sure, everyone quotes it now and gets the in-jokes, but I was actually a high-schooler when this high-school movie came out. I wasn't a kid watching a high-school movie (like when I watched Clueless at 8 years old) or a twenty-something reliving the glory days of high school with a movie. This movie was made for me, okay? And it's been a long time since I've re-watched it, so let's get on with this and relive my high school glory days of quoting Mean Girls.

Isn't Janis the coolest?

She has the best comebacks, she's super confident, she doesn't take anybody's shit. We all strive to be Janis. If you're not, you're doing life wrong. Well, except she totally buys into the whole cliques thing and starts the whole plan to ruin Regina's life, which isn't very nice. But, everyone learns their lesson in the end, so I guess it's okay.

Why does everyone think The Plastics are so cool?

They're more like outcasts. The three of them hang out with only each other, right? They look so sad sitting at their cafeteria table by themselves. In my school, the "popular" kids were the ones in the big group of other "popular" kids in the cafeteria and the ones who talked to everyone as they walked down the halls. Any super exclusive group of three girls would have been weirdos, even if they were super rich and pretty.

I know that teens tend to divide into friend groups/cliques, but do they actually make up rules?

All the rules that The Plastics have just seems like another way for them to have control. Girls like that are obviously unhappy and controlling their lives like that gives them comfort. Sorry to get all grown-up on you, but it's been ten years. I have some adult-ish perspective on teens now.

Who would create a Burn Book after the age of ten?

I feel like that is the kind of thing that I would have done with my friends when I was a wee kid, not a teenager. I went through my trouble child, back-stabbing-bitch-frenemies phase pretty young, though. By the time I was in high school I was over that shit.

Did anyone ever go to a high school party like that?

So many people. There are just so many people. Where is the parental supervision?! Is there alcohol in those cups?!

How long has Janis been waiting for an opportunity to execute this plan?

I think she's been planning this for a while. She is really prepared.

Are we really supposed to believe that they are using a tiny boombox sitting in the middle of the stage to play music for that huge auditorium?

Oh, I guess it's okay because it's for a joke.

How did they manage to go the whole school year with this double-friend-life?

Cady talks to Janis and Damien in class and at the mall all the time. No one noticed? And they must get together to work on their evil plan, so how is Cady fitting in school, homework, and two separate friend groups hang time? 

And, why are they still friends, anyway? Wouldn't Regina have gotten bored with her little experiment pretty quickly? And if Cady is being such a Plastic bitch, why are Janis and Damien still friends with her? This is a very long-term scheme. I don't think teenagers have attention spans that long. I remember waiting a weekend to see a crush again felt like forever in teen time.

"Is butter a carb?"

At this point it seems clear that Regina knows what is going on. She knows that her "diet" isn't working. She's breaking her rules. It seems like she's going along with it because she has her own plan to get back at Cady...

Who does this MAN think he is telling young WOMEN how they should act?

You don't have to be female to see that there is a problem with the way these girls were behaving, but this seems like another situation where women would rise up a protest against a man telling them what to do. That's right, give up and let Ms. Norburry take over. This is woman's work.

Would joining The Matheletes still be considered "social suicide"?

Nerds are cool now, right? If someone made fun of you for liking math, you could just come back with "I'm going to use my mad math skillz to pilot the first manned mission to Mars in 20 years. You think that's lame?" Or maybe it's not so much the times, but their age. I didn't take science classes in high school, but now I love learning about science. Is it because science is cool now, or because I'm no longer a teenager who only cares about having less homework?

Does it really work to spend an entire movie glamorizing horrible behavior if you make a heartfelt speech at the end about how wrong the behavior was?

People don't remember this movie because it's how they learned to not call each other sluts. They remember the jokes, and the quotable dialogue, most of which is mean. Obviously, my school sent all the girls to see this movie so we would learn the lesson at the end, but I don't think we did. We still went on to be gossiping, back-stabbing, frenemy bitches sometimes. I think it's only now that we're out of high school that we want to reblog subtitled screenshots of the final scenes because we've all learned about feminism. But back then, we were probably more interested in following Lindsay Lohan's downward spiral on PerezHilton.com or learning to dance to Kelis' Milkshake like Regina's little sister.

Why doesn't Gretchen get a happy ending?

She found a new "Queen Bee" to serve? That's horrible! Everyone else grew and learned from their experiences, but Gretchen failed at the public apology/trust fall and then just kept living her sad subservient life.

Did we all learn a lesson?

I learned that Lindsay Lohan looks best as a redhead. Rachel McAdams looks weird in that blonde wig. Lacey Chabert has done nothing of interest since Mean Girls. Amanda Seyfried has come a long way from playing the dumb sidekick. And Tina Fey will always be our reigning comedy queen.

Love ya! *kiss*kiss*

Recollections: The Matrix

It's been 15 years since The Matrix was released. Really? 15 years? No, surely that's a glitch in the Matrix...

Let’s just get this question out of the way because I know it’s the first one on all of our minds right now…  
What is the Matrix?!

Did every little girl who watched this want to be bad ass Trinity, too? 
Or just me? I was 9 when The Matrix came out in 1999. I wanted to be Trinity. It was probably because she was the only female character in the movie, to be honest. Sigh.

“Get up, Trinity. Just get up. Get. Up.”
I use a similar self-motivation technique to get myself out of bed in the morning.

Remember floppy discs?
Ha ha ha ha! Floppy discs...

Do these kinds of clubs really exist and do they still play Dragula by Rob Zombie?
I never understand club scene in movies because they show the commoners dancing all in a mass to some bad ass, but not really dance-able song while the tough crew sit in the VIP area and manage to have conversations without leaning in and screaming to be able to hear.

Do you remember this kind of cell phone?
I had a Spice Girls toy cell phone that slid open. Man, it was the coolest. Who wants to flip when you can slide? I wish I still had that Spice Girls phone…

Which pill would you take?

I think we all like to say we would take the red pill but I bet most of us would rather just chill in the Matrix than live in the real world. But, Neo’s already gotten to this point. He’s not going to turn back now. What an exciting adventure! I think if I got to this point, knew I was in The Matrix, then I would just want to stay in the Matrix, but could they give me some cheat codes like infinite money and health?

Also, how do his glasses stay on his nose?
That is the greatest mystery of The Matrix indeed… Maybe I just need to realize the truth; there are no glasses…

“I can’t go back, can I?” “No. But if you could, would you really want to?”

If you found out the world was a lie, would you want to stay in the real world, fighting to survive, or go back to your comfortable life? This reminds me of a Doctor Who episode wherein the Queen chooses over and over again to forget the horrible truth behind her country’s survival, so that they can go on living comfortably. But, I feel like we face this kind of decision very often and most people choose to ignore the “real world” and go back to their comfortable lives. How many times have you seen something on the news, or posted in your Facebook feed about the terrors going on around the world? How many times have you actually done something about it? I guessing, like me, you feel bad for a moment, perhaps even click on the article to learn more, but in the end you are just grateful that you can choose to leave it behind and continue your life as it is. Unfortunately, there are not many people who, when faced with the world’s suffering, jump into action. It’s easy to ignore a Facebook post, but if you found yourself in the thick of it, would you want to go home and forget about it, or would it finally be close enough to change your life?

“How did I beat you?”
Because you’re really badass, okay, Morpheus? We get it.

How did they not see Cypher’s betrayal coming?

He’s such a dick. It’s so obvious that he doesn’t want to be there, he doesn’t like anyone, he outright says that he would rather be in the Matrix and he drinks disgusting moonshine. Also, he is bald with a soul patch. Obviously a baddie.

Is that really what you would call deja-vu?
Seeing the exact same thing 3 seconds apart isn’t deja-vu… Deja-vu is when your brain has a glitch and is experiencing and remembering at the same time. That scene always bugged me. I get that they wanted to show something identical twice, to demonstrate deja-vu, but deja-vu would have been if he just saw the cat once and said “Woah. Deja-vu.” That aside, do you also worry that you are in the Matrix when you get deja-vu?

Do you agree that the human race is a virus?

I think it’s a pretty fair analogy. If the Earth is a living organism, which supports many other living organisms (Whether you like it or not, the human body houses something like 2 pounds of bacteria, FYI. Organisms support other organisms.) and of all the organisms on Earth, humans are the only ones changing the Earth to support our own life, sacrificing the health of Earth for our own procreation, and are eager to spread ourselves to other planets that we could infect. It’s strange to hear from a computer, but he’s right. We are the biggest virus problem.

Dudes, why do you keep wasting your bullets on the concrete pillars?

You know you can’t shoot through them, right? You’re not going to hit him as long as he’s behind one. These guys are terrible. Save your ammo. Shoot the targets, not the walls, dum dums. Yeesh.

If the Agents can manipulate The Matrix, why do they stay human?

It’s their program, right? So, they could add to it, change the physics, or instantly create matter? Why don’t they become killing machines more efficient than humans? Or, why can’t they just change a little bit of code in the Matrix and make people dead? Maybe, the computers who took over the world are not actually so clever...

Why doesn’t Neo die?

Morpheous said “The body cannot live without the mind.” but if my mind doesn’t think I’m dead, then I’m not dead? Neo just took “mind over matter” to the next level. Or I guess it’s “mind over Matrix”. Heh heh heh.

Okay, but seriously, are we or are we not actually in The Matrix?
That is the question...

Recollections: Cool Runnings

New Blog Feature Alert! This feature is for those movies considered “classics”, that we’ve all seen (several times), that I can write about without spoiling anything. For these movies, I have a lot of questions. Let’s take a look back at our favorite movies through the form of questions. A lot of questions. Some of which may actually have answers, but most of which just bring up more questions.

The Olympics were last month. Right? I try to ignore it as much as possible as I have very strong opinions about the Olympics. (Namely the money and the spirit of competition). The one good thing about all that Olympics talk was that it reminded me to watch one of my favorite movies, Cool Runnings. And that is as close as I want to get to the Olympics.

“Jamaica, we have a bobsled team!"

Is this based on a true story?
Wikipedia tells me, yes, it is. Although, a lot has been changed to make it a more dramatic movie. Well, real life is never as interesting as movies, so that makes sense.

"Feel the rhythm! Feel the rhyme! Get on up! It’s bobsled push-cart time!"

Anybody want to start a push-cart league?
This looks super fun! Was it just an 80’s thing? Or a Jamaica thing? This seems way cooler than those soap box derbies The Scouts or whoever does. But, why are there children riding on the carts, if the adult is doing the pushing and the driving? I feel a child endangerment lawsuit coming on...

They really wouldn’t redo that race?
Is that not considered the same as someone interfering with the race? The guy who tripped, fine, he fucked up his shot, but the two he tripped didn’t do anything wrong! That doesn’t seem fair.

"What’s a bobsled?"
A bobsled is a push-cart with no wheels.

"How ‘bout I draw a line down the middle of your head so it looks like a butt?"
Ha ha ha ha. I did it. It looks like a butt.

"Sanka, man, whatcha smokin’?"
Accurate depiction of Canadian winter is accurate. (He's not smoking, he's breathing.)

Is that really how you register for the Olympics?
You just walk up to a guy at a table wearing a lot of buttons on his lapels and say you want to register a Jamaican bobsled team? Maybe I’ll try that some time.

Is this the brotherly love that everyone says the Olympics is all about?
Whenever I say that I am against the Olympics, people come back with this nonsense about it bringing all the countries of the world together. Ya, it brings all the countries of the world together to compete! For what? Little medals? Pride? Statistics? Money? They try to make it look like they’re creating world peace with the beautiful opening and closing ceremonies, but it’s all just competition. Everyone wants to be the best. There are no touching stories of athletes carrying fallen competitors across finish lines in real life, guys. Those people are in it to win it, no matter the cost. I just don’t see the point. It costs billions of dollars to put on the Olympics. If we put that much money towards helping people in need, instead of fostering unhealthy competitive nature in people, maybe we could actually celebrate some world peace. Just saying.

"You wanna know what I see? I see pride. I see power. I see a bad ass mother who don’t take no crap off of nobody."

Which Jamaican bobsledder are you?
I’m Sanka. When it comes to bobsledding, we are all Sanka. Because who da fuck can actually do bobsled? Or chin-ups?!

“What exactly does it mean?”
‘Cool Runnings’ means ‘peace be the journey’.

Is this the best version of The Lord’s Prayer you’ve ever heard?
I’m not one for sports or religion, but this is brilliant. “Our Father, who art in Calgary, Bobsled be thy name. Thy kingdom come, gold medals won, on Earth as it is in Turn Seven. With Liberty and Justice for Jamaica and Haile Selassie. Amen.”

Are you feeling the Olympic feels?
I am. I feel the feels. Put something in a movie and it is in a central line directly into my heart. If you tried to tell me the story of the Jamaican bobsled team, I would be like “Ha ha ha. Jamaica. Weed. Bob Marley. WTF is bobsledding, anyway?” But goddamnit, you tell me that story in a movie and I am ALL THE FEELS. Jamaica feels. Olympic feels. Bobsled feels.

Are you crying?
*sniff* Me, neither...