Intertextuality

Intertextuality 

is a term used to explain the visual referencing linking texts that have been shaped by using others texts’. Texts often borrow from each other and frequently the audience may well recognise some aspects of mise en, camera angles, and specific whole scenes, snippets of sound or methods of editing and sometimes the overall plot of the Text.

For example “She's the Man” is loosely based on a Shakespearean comedy “Twelfth Night”. The plots of She's the Man and Twelfth Night run along similar lines, such as Olivia kissing Sebastian rather than the disguised Viola, or Duke enlisting "Sebastian" (the disguised Viola) to help him gain Olivia's attention (in the play, the Duke Orsino enlisted "Cesario" to help him win Olivia). The main characters share the names of the characters in Twelfth Night, and are in a similar love triangle.

The film's connections to the play are emphasized through a number of visual and dialogue references:

In the trailer, when Viola walks through the school's campus outside, a billboard can be seen on the left hand side advertising the school's production of "What You Will." 

The pizza parlor where the kids hang out is called Cesario's. 

Duke says, "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them," a quote from the letter read by Malvolio in Twelfth Night. 

Various names in the film are taken from Twelfth Night, although the roles in the film bear little or no similarity to their namesakes.