Mean Girls Club: Pink Dawn

This exhibition of mid-century dime-store dame rebellion is so over-the-top that it misses the mark. In response to a botched attack on their hideout, a group of femme fatales known as the Mean Girls Club sparks a crime wave fueled by misandry and a thirst for the destruction of 1950s ideals. A horrified Mayor Schlomo enlists mechanic Roxy to infiltrate the gang’s ranks and hand-deliver them to him. Needing cash to care for her unwell grandfather, Roxy accepts his offer. After breaching the club, who ridicule each other and mourn their smudged eyebrows more openly than their lost “sisters,” Roxy leads the Mean Girls into a trap, resulting in their arrest. But when Roxy suffers a devastating personal blow, she’s left regretting her actions at a grim crossroads where all the women are in peril. This feisty noir is black, white, and hot pink all over, but the toxic girl gang’s clawing at each other while stabbing down the patriarchy undercuts the seemingly intended messages of feminist empowerment. Still, nostalgic pulp genre fans will get a kick out of the expressive art style and rowdy sexploitation references. (May)