Plastic fantastic ... Mean Girls. Photograph: Paramount/Everett/Rex Features  Ten years ago this week, the film that would transform Lindsay Lohan into a teen movie queen premiered in the US. Lilo's ticket to adolescent idolatry was handed to her by future 30 Rock creator Tina Fey – then Saturday Night Live's head writer – and director Mark Waters. Mean Girls would gross $129m, and although it didn't exactly revolutionise the high-school comedy genre, it injected sass at a time when the biggest hitters were largely samey Hilary Duff vehicles. With a plot that embraces and busts cliche in equal measure, a highly quotable screenplay and a killer cast, it gained a fanatical cult following.  Fey, who wrote the script, plays the film's moral compass, Ms Norbury. She drew inspiration for the screenplay from her own teenage years, as well as a self-help book (Rosalind Wiseman's Queen Bees & Wannabees), and as a result the social hierarchy at North Shore feels real and decidedly mean. Fresh-off-the-boat high-schooler Cady Heron (Lohan) subverts her role in the Plastics clique as she manoeuvres her way through the school, showing up its superficial social hierarchy for what it is.  As for those knockout quotes, from the bizarre ("Karen, you can't just ask people why they're white"; "You go Glen Coco!"; "Too gay to function") to the brutal ("You smell like a baby prostitute"), they're all instantly recognisable, and live on in everyday parlance and frequent online memes. It's a fitting legacy for a film that, as Daniel Franzese (who plays Damian) recently told Cosmopolitan, was "the first one of those [high-school] movies that also had the internet. Mean Girls is dissected on the internet." He went on to talk about how diehards use any opportunity to fling him quotes and pics of Damian-inspired getup via Twitter.  Mean Girls might be true to life, but it's bonkers too. There's plenty of screen time for Kevin G's mathematical rapping, Karen's meteorologically talented breasts and the gym teacher who warns that sex will lead to certain pregnancy and death. Even the Burn Book, the tome of rumours, secrets and lies penned by the Plastics, is meta to the max: it's an improbably huge, lipstick-stained diary with its name spelled out on the cover in ransom-note-style cuttings.  The acting isn't half bad, either. Rachel McAdams never falters as sweatpant-wearing sociopath Regina George, and Franzese and Lizzy Caplan (Janis) play their outsider roles to perfection.  Like many teen movies pre- and post-, Mean Girls has all the hallmarks of high school Americana, with bullying and bitching taking centre-stage. As a whole package, however, it's a standout look at adolescence that has managed 10 years as a pop culture mainstay without feeling like a MySpace-era throwback.  Reading on mobile? Click here to view  1) The rules of feminism: Poor Cady. She's failing maths as an excuse to chat up cute classmate Aaron. But he's off limits, because Betty Friedan says so...  Reading on mobile? Click here to view  2) God, Karen: A triple whammy. Former "half virgin" Regina cries to taco fan Karen, who has a not-so-special hidden talent.  Reading on mobile? Click here to view  3) What's so great about Caesar?! Her dad might have invented the Toaster Strudel, but Gretchen Wieners has had a pretty rough ride in Regina's shadow, barred from simple pleasures like wearing hoop earrings. One day, the parallels between North Shore and ancient Rome send our favourite fetch one into a frenzy.  Reading on mobile? Click here to view  4) You can't sit with us: With Regina's "popularity" on the wane, the head Plastic's own nonsensical rules come back to bite her.  Reading on mobile? Click here to view  5) She doesn't even go here! Ms Norbury's group therapy gets a dose of baking metaphors and feelings courtesy of a tearful trespasser, but Damian's not buying it.
Hannah J Davies: How the film that made Lindsay Lohan a household name skewered the social hierarchies of American high schools and spawned a rabid cult following