Ama: Two Movies

I decided to contribute my remaining friendship texts as a part of the classroom canon.  I believe that these last two texts are important friendship texts because they both show what friendship is and because of that ultimate show what friendship isn’t in the process. I also like these texts because they are not obvious friendship texts but if viewers take a closer look they will see the underlying message that both texts are portraying.

Mean Girls. Dir. Mark Waters. Perf. Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Amanda Seyfried, Lacey Chabert.Paramount, 2004. DVD.

Mean Girls is the exact opposite of what friendship is. I call this movie the anti-friendship example; however this example of anti-friendship ultimately brings to light what real friendship is/is not.  In this movie a young girl named Cady Heron moves to a new town , having lived in a jungle in Africa for her whole life. She was home schooled her whole life and is now being placed in a public high school. Her first friends, named Janis and Damian, that she makes are considered the “losers” or “freaks” of high school. She then meets the plastics, who are considered the ”in crowd”. The plastics consist of three girls named Regina, Gretchen, and Karen. Regina is considered the queen bee and the ring leader of the group, Gretchen is basically Regina’s shadow and full time follower, and Karen is considered the dumb blonde and “one of the dumbest people you will ever meet.”  Janis and Damian convince Cady to keep a relationship with the plastics to secretly mess with them. Cady spreads lies within the group to try to get them to turn on each other. Things don’t go according to planned and Cady ends up becoming exactly the people she was rebelling against. She ends up becoming a plastic. When everything falls apart she soon realizes that the plastics are not her real friends. The plastics seem like the best of friends on the outside but take a closer look you will see it is quite the opposite. There is absolutely no loyalty between any of them and they are so quick to turn on each other in order to make themselves look better or gain something. They talk behind each other’s back like it is no big deal but are offended if they find out that the others are doing the same. They all think they are better than each other. That is not friendship is supposed to be. This is movie is a great friendship text because it drastically shows what friendship isn’t. When viewers compare the friendship between Cady and the plastics and then between Cady and Janis and Damian, they can see the difference.  In the end the plastics ended up separating and joining different groups. Cady’s relationship with her two friends remained constant. That is because it was based on all the things a good friendship should be based on. This text was a satire of high school drama but by showing what friendship isn’t, it ultimately showed what friendship is.

Lilo and Stitch. Dir. Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois. Perf. Chris Sanders, Daveigh Chase, Tia Carrere, Jason Lee. Disney, 2002. DVD

 Lilo and Stitch is about a girl who finds an alien called 626, aka stitch. Lilo lives with her sister Nani in a small house in Hawaii. Lilo has very unusual interests so making friends is a challenge for her. She is even has trouble bonding with her own sister. Lilo is very lonely so Nani decides to let her adopt an animal from the nearby animal shelter.  Against Nani’s wishes, Lilo wants to adopt stitch as her pet. Little did they know that stitch would make such a huge impact on both of their lives. A once lonely girl finally finds a friend that she can do everything with. Even though he is an alien that is wanted by his creator, he proves to be an excellent best friend to Lilo and ultimately becomes her family. She often refers to him as “Ohana” which means family. This movie shows how friendship can be found in the most unlikely places. Friendships can take place between humans and non-humans. Sometimes the best of friends are things that you can’t communicate with.