Ever since it was announced that Greta Gerwig was going to be making a live-action Barbie movie, the big question was why? Why step into the corporate I.P. factory after the likes of Lady Bird and Little Women -and why this I.P. in particular, one that is ubiquitous but also kind of bland and dated. Barbie is a concept more than a character, more than even a toy. Yet that very fact gives an idea as to why it might be an appealing project for Gerwig as well as her husband/co-writer Noah Baumbach. The question shouldn’t have been why would Gerwig make a Barbie movie, but how?
It’s very fitting that Gerwig’s vision of Barbie features a character dubbed ‘Weird Barbie’ (played by Kate McKinnon) because her movie is a very weird Barbie that doesn’t go in any of the directions you might expect of the children’s toy franchise as it has existed up to this point. Taking a cue perhaps from The Lego Movie, it casts the Barbie World in a self-aware context -existing as a reality distinct from yet in a direct relationship with the real world; though the exact nature of its dimensions is shrugged off as it isn’t ultimately that important -the real world of this movie is depicted with a certain degree of simple fantasy too, reminiscent of the storybook approach via adult comedy of something like Elf.
And it’s refreshingly bold that Gerwig feels comfortable with that kind of freewheeling direction for her story -that it can be playful as it hones in on the existential crisis of a doll and the broader culture and conversation that that doll has often been made a focal point of. Because Barbie fully acknowledges the controversy that has for decades arisen around the popularity of this doll and what she means as a symbol of womanhood and femininity, constricting gender roles and the patriarchy (a term I’m sure has never shown up so much in the script of a multi-million dollar Hollywood feature). And while Barbie doesn’t bring much in the way of new ideas or nuances to the table as far as these issues go, it does crystallize and legitimize those that are common in the conversation from a platform not typically afforded to them. It is still more than enough to pinch the nerve of male entitlement -which is why you may see the movie causing a particular stir in the online right wing-o-sphere.
The simplicity of the way Gerwig approaches these topics though is in its way useful and inspired. Barbie World is very much a community of naivety, where everyone has a fairly limited emotional range and an even more limited grasp of mature concepts. Comically there are some great innuendo jokes to be had in this, but it also proves a necessary foundation for the way that both Barbie (Margot Robbie, also the film’s producer) and Ken (Ryan Gosling) respond to and learn from the real world, once they travel there to figure out the cause of Barbie’s sudden preoccupation with distinctly adult concerns of mortality.
It is a kind of arrested juvenilia that most characterizes Barbie, Ken and their assorted counterparts (all of them with the same two names, save for Michael Cera’s hapless Allan and Emerald Fennell’s pregnant Midge); and as such the film functions as a coming-of-age story for these childishly-minded characters as they are exposed for the first time to concepts of death, sexism, and indeed patriarchy -which Ken naturally takes to in lieu of the very matriarchal structure of Barbie World. It is a fascinating lens for sure, and even in the midst of a comedy sensibility, reflects some truth in the way children take in new information and viewpoints. Like Barbie’s presumptions about how she’ll be treated given her misled idea of her own influence; or Ken latching onto the aspects of patriarchy that sound the most fun to an immature mind: horses and cars and stuff. There’s something very smart in how Gerwig illustrates the way our culture is impressionable, in the ways it tears Barbie down and builds Ken up. Openly, Barbie is confronted with all the baggage that has come with the Barbie brand -a teenage girl spilling each of the ways Barbie has been accused of harming feminism. And the movie doesn’t invalidate that perspective necessarily, but it frames it intelligently within a context of women’s agency.
America Ferrera plays the Mattel employee whose depressed thoughts brought out this Barbie’s crisis, and she gets a speech that serves as a kind of centrepiece to what Gerwig aims to get across: a laundry list of all of the unfair societal expectations foisted upon women that they are pressured to precisely adhere to to be respected within a patriarchal framework. It’s powerful and it asserts Gerwig’s thesis for Barbie that while her evolution is important, she doesn’t have to be what anyone else tells her to be -a point driven home by a surprising and sweet appearance by Rhea Perlman as Barbie creator Ruth Handler.
This all isn’t to suggest that the movie has nothing to say about Ken. In fact, in his portrait of easy-minded insecurity and the rudimentary silliness of toxic masculinity, Gosling turns in the standout performance of the film -a reminder for those who’ve forgotten The Nice Guys just how sharp his comedic instincts are. Through him and the other Kens’ quick embrace of a masculine power structure, Barbie makes a mockery of masculine stereotypes in delightfully clever and specific ways (the use of one song and a couple movie references being particularly stinging). But as Gerwig has fun doing this, she’s sure to point out how both an imagined matriarchal structure (in which the Kens all have nondescript roles, are objectified and stereotyped), and a real patriarchy are harmful and limiting for men. They may be unequivocally more privileged, but are still boxed in by homogeneous cultural and behavioural expectations around what “men should be”. And there is a wonderful catharsis for this, as well as the room for Ken, avatar for men as Barbie is for women, to grow beyond the strictures of gendered binary. A wonderfully bold theme for a movie of this reach.
Gerwig’s craftsmanship is really a star of the film as much as Robbie and Gosling. On just a production level, Barbie World is incredible -authentically built and designed to look as bright and plastic as possible (and I’m certain many of the homes and environments, as with the clothes, are derived from real Barbie play-sets). Her colour palette is big and vibrant, the abundance of bright pink giving it such a unique look. Beyond this though, she stays true to a kind of toy aesthetic, with very clear two-dimensional backdrops and makeup that gives all the Barbies and Kens a colourful sheen. The real world obviously stands in stark contrast, but even it is has its surreal corners, based on what is seen of Mattel, run by a defensive Will Ferrell and his all-male board of directors. I wonder if Mattel had seen Jacques Tati’s PlayTime if they would have let Gerwig illustrate their offices with the exact same corporate-dystopian aesthetic of insulated cubes for office drones. Gerwig actually pulls from some very fascinating cinematic reference points, in particular Powell and Pressburger movies like A Matter of Life and Death and The Red Shoes for the artificiality and colour schemes of her fantasy world, and classic Hollywood screwball comedies and musicals in how the Barbies and Kens interact. There are a couple musical sequences in the movie that are staged terrifically -especially the original song “I’m Just Ken”, a climactic number that evokes the surreal and grandiose Gene Kelly style of An American in Paris or On the Town. In all of these brilliant and bonkers choices, Gerwig demonstrates a palpable enthusiasm and genuine confidence of artistry that is thrilling to take in.
There is a certain cynicism to the film, a corporate product that for all of its self-awareness is still a marketing tool for Mattel, still upholds and reveres Barbie as a brand. But not since The Lego Movie has a movie managed to have its cake and eat it too like this one: branded synergy while being meaningful, imaginative, and at times deliriously funny. Much as she may be removed from the grounded atmosphere and emotional immediacy of her prior work, Gerwig is still in her element, proving herself stylistically versatile and strongly inventive even within restraints. She made a Barbie movie that not only works but is effectively transgressive -one of Hollywood’s most valuable creatives.
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