It also borrows heavily from one of the greatest thrillers ever made.
In 1951, Alfred Hitchcock made Strangers On A Train, based on a novel by master-of-psychological thriller Patricia Highsmith, which came out a year earlier.
It tells the story of two strangers who meet on a train, discuss their life problems - one of them hates their wife, the other hates their father - so they agree to do each other's murders.
That is essentially the same central plot of new Netflix dark comedy Do Revenge, in which two teen high-schoolers meet up by chance and agree to "do revenge" for each other.
We find out that scholarship-supported Drea (Camilla Mendes) had her nude videos leaked by her boyfriend Max (Austin Abrams), while Eleanor (Maya Hawke) was forcefully outed by Carissa (Avi Capri), a girl who wasn't ready to come out of the closet, so she shoved her girlfriend out to take the spotlight off her.
Feeling ostracised by their very rich friends in their very elite high school, Drea and Eleanor cross paths and begin planning ways to destroy the reputations of the people who did them wrong, which is where the influences of Mean Girls and Cruel Intentions come into play.
At the time of writing, it is currently the No.1 most-watched movie on Netflix, and it has a very solid score of 85% on Rotten Tomatoes, with the majority of critics vibing with the movie's prickly screenplay and serrated performances:
Collider - "If you’re looking for a typical teen movie riddled with clichés and stereotypes, keep scrolling through your Netflix queue. This daring dark comedy both pays homage to and deconstructs the ‘90s high school set films you know and love, and does so with deliciously satisfying results."
The Guardian - "Its outsized mean girl ruthlessness with a candy-coated shell, led by Mendes and Hawke’s commanding performances, is a biting good time."
Paste Magazine - "It’s got enough biting snark to hook viewers from the jump, and enough heart to keep them around until the end."
Do Revenge is available to watch on Netflix right now.
Clip via Netflix
