2004, PG-13, 95 minutes

Leave it to Saturday Night Live's Tina Fey to come up with a fresh take on the teen movie. The "Weekend Update" co-anchor and SNL sketch writer makes her feature writing debut with Mean Girls, a witty commentary on high school social politics. The SNL funny lady also had the good sense to write a scene-stealing supporting role for herself as a teacher in this bright and entertaining comedy.

Cady Heron (Lindsay Lohan) is sixteen and experiencing traditional school for the first time. Having been raised and home-schooled by her zoologist parents in Africa for her entire life, Cady immediately feels the culture shock of American public school. She's drawn to outsiders Janis (Lizzy Caplan) and Damian (Daniel Franzese), who teach her the custom of skipping class. Cady is also naturally beautiful, which catches the attention of "the plastics," the prettiest and most popular girls in school.

Regina (Rachel McAdams), the queen bee of the plastics, grants Cady the privilege of sitting at the popular girls' lunch table. Janis and Damian encourage Cady to go along with the plastics, so they can all have a good laugh about it later. Complications arise when Cady develops a crush on Regina's ex-boyfriend Aaron (Jonathan Bennett). Regina wins him back to spite Cady, who then undergoes a physical and behavioral makeover, becoming just as vapid, made-up, and stuck-up as any of the plastics. She becomes a "mean girl," determined to beat Regina at her own game.

Fey co-stars as Ms. Norbury, Cady and Aaron's calculus teacher who, not so coincidentally, displays much of the same dry wit that Fey herself does on SNL. Ms. Norbury and Mr. Duvall (Tim Meadows) are at a loss when Regina's "burn book" (a picture diary filled with nasty comments about most of the school's female population) finds its way to campus. Ms. Norbury takes special offense to the book's false implication that she's a drug dealer. Tensions become so high that the faculty stages an intervention with all the girls in the school gym, with highly amusing results.

Mean Girls navigates the choppy waters of high school life in a light and breezy way. A high-spirited cast and Fey's inspired screenplay make it fly. Lohan, on the heels of a winning performance in Freaky Friday, proves again she's a natural comedic actress. McAdams and Lacey Chabert have fun with their sometimes over-the-top roles as the plastics (Chabert's Gretchen likes to pepper conversations with the fact that her father invented Toaster Strudel). Fey consistently gets laughs, and she, director Mark Waters, and producer Lorne Michaels wisely enlisted fellow SNL vets Meadows, Amy Poehler, and Ana Gasteyer in small roles.

Mean Girls doesn't reinvent the teen-movie wheel. Anyone who's seen Heathers or Clueless will find themselves in familiar territory. Fey's screenplay has a keen wit, however, and a bright young cast helps to make the movie thoroughly enjoyable. Mean Girls is not just another teen movie.