Barbie

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I have to admit when I heard that there was a Barbie movie, I winced a bit and wondered what on earth you could fill it with to make it fit feature parameters. And then the marketing for it has been absolutely everywhere within the last month, that it’s impossible not to get a tad curious. So when a friend said that movie night was Barbie, I was ready to see what all the hype was about. I am happy to say that I got a real surprise and that the hype turned out to be well-placed.

The films tells the story of Stereotypical Barbie (Margot Robbie) living happily in Barbieland where women are in charge and the men are… around the beach. Things start to get strange when Barbie has thoughts of death and her heels touch the ground. Seeking information from the ostracized Weird Barbie, Barbie learns that whoever is playing with her in the real world is having this effect. So Barbie sets off to find this player and make them feel better. But things become complicated when Ken (Ryan Gosling) stows away in her car and discovers the Patriarchy, the CEO of Matel tries to chase her down, and the real world turns out to be filled with girls who hate Barbie.

In a similar way to The Lego Movie, Barbie is a clever social commentary on the state of the world. But instead of depicting it through the eyes of a child, it’s from the point of view of a mature modern woman. Director Greta Gerwig delivers another classic piece of pro-fem cinema that’s hugely clever and metafictive, dismantles the patriarchy as well as age-old genre tropes, and delivers the laughs as well as the sighs and the heartwarming feels.

Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling both deliver glorious performances with Robbie treading that fine line between adorably ignorant and aggressively ditsy perfectly. Even though the Barbies are misguided as to how the real world is compared to their own, they are all still genuine and while it would have been very easy, almost impossible not to be the ditsy stereotypical Barbie, Robbie plays a Barbie that is real and relatable rather than plastic.

Gosling however (in true nature of the movie) steals all the scenes he’s in. Inadvertently becoming the villain midway through, Ken’s crisis story of existential crisis is equally, if not more, on par with Barbie’s. Beginning the film as the lovesick and overlooked protagonist (traditionally the female role in many romantic comedies), Ken goes through the most overt and physical change in an effort to either get the girl or get a clue. Ken’s character journey is all about discovery of identity, self-worth and self-love and it’s really sweet, funny, and dramatic to watch.

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Set against the eloquent, witty, and biting narration of Helen Mirren, Barbie is a truly clever social commentary that’s funny, witty, and heartwarming. It’s really very clever and I would highly recommend it.

Director: Greta Gerwig, 2023

Cast: Margot Robbit, Ryan Gosling, Kate McKinnon, America Ferrara, Issa Rae, Alexandra Shipp, Hari Nef, Emma Mackey, Sharon Rooney, Ana Cruz Kayne, Ritu Arya, Dua Lipa, Simu Liu, Kinglsey Ben-Adir, Ncuto Gatwa, Scott Evans, John Cena, Michael Cera, Will Smith, Ariana Greenblatt, Rhea Perlman, & Helen Mirren