Gender
Viola wants to play soccer and is very good at it, but her school does not prioritize girls' sports, and she is not allowed to try out for the boys' team based on the blanket assumption that girls can never be as good at soccer as boys. She decides to disguise herself as her brother so that she can join the boys' soccer team and prove this wrong. Thus the entire plot is set into motion by Viola's frustrations with the broad assumptions that others make about gender.
After Viola dresses up as a boy, gender becomes an even more front-and-center theme, as she must learn to navigate the world of men in spite of her female identity. She puts on a new voice and tries to talk the talk. She learns about the psyches of young men from the inside. Simultaneously, she must also enter a debutante ball as her feminine self to appease her mother, but she isn't very good at being ladylike. Viola is caught between genders: not masculine enough for her male peers, nor feminine enough to be the debutante of her mother's dreams. The film examines the ways that society makes assumptions about people (particularly young people) based on their gender, and the ways that young people can break down these barriers. In the end, Viola proves that girls can be just as good at soccer as boys, and learns that even the most macho of jocks, like Duke Orsino, can be hiding a sensitive and tender core.
Romance
The love story in She's the Man is actually quite hard to follow because all of the characters are attracted to someone who is attracted to someone else, and at the center is Viola, who is pretending to be a gender she is not. Duke is attracted to Olivia, who is attracted to someone she thinks is Sebastian but is actually Viola—who in turn is attracted to Duke. By the end of the film, everyone gets paired up with the person of their dreams and there is a sense of romantic closure in spite of all the chaos. The film is a typical romantic comedy, in which people end up with their soulmates after a period of conflict.
Sports
Sports, particularly soccer, are also a central theme in the film. The insistence that girls cannot be as good as boys at soccer is what leads Viola to adopt her persona as Sebastian in the first place. She is determined to show her community that she is just as good at soccer as any guy, and by the end of the film, when she scores a definitive penalty kick on her doubting ex-boyfriend, Justin, Viola proves her point. Soccer is what Viola is most passionate about, and throughout the film, we see numerous montages of her kicking the ball around the field and thriving as a soccer player.
Identity
In the beginning of the film, Viola is caught between identities. While she is deemed ineligible to try out for the boys' soccer team, she is also decidedly too unfeminine (and too uninterested in femininity) to be a good debutante. Throughout the course of the film, by adopting the persona of "Sebastian," Viola is able to integrate the two sides of her identity, and by the end, she self-actualizes. She wins the soccer game in a dramatic feat, and also walks in the debutante ball with a hunky boyfriend on her arm. The film takes a closer look at the ways that high schoolers deal with the integration of gender-nonconforming interests and heterosexuality.
Betrayal
While Viola's disguise allows her to prove something to her community about her own identity and abilities, it also compromises her standing with the people she had to betray in the process. After she reveals she is actually a girl, Duke forgives Viola for certain betrayals, but also feels used and lied to. Viola not only subverts normative ideas of gender by posing as a boy, but she also cons the boys she meets into thinking they can trust her in the way they trust their "bros." Even after the climactic reveal and victory, Viola and Duke must heal the betrayal that has taken place between them before they can pursue a romance.
Rebellion
Another theme in the film is rebellion. Viola rebels against the gender stereotypes about girls, the notion that they cannot play soccer as well as boys. She also bucks her mother's expectations, insisting that she will not be the perfect debutante she is expected to be. Viola's mother wants nothing more than for her to wear beautiful gowns and act like a refined lady, but Viola has other plans. Additionally, Viola's twin brother, Sebastian, is also rebellious, running away to London to pursue his dreams of rock stardom, instead of going to school.
Forgiveness
Ultimately, even though Viola has committed a huge betrayal, the people close to her decide to forgive her. Olivia, who is confused by the fact that she was misled to fall in love with a girl, forgives her and pursues a relationship with the real Sebastian. Duke takes a little more encouragement, but after some thinking decides to forgive Viola.
