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It's quite difficult to write about a film a few weeks after seeing it, but I'll try anyways... By the way, there'll be some spoilers down below.

To be quite honest, my expectations for this movie weren't all that high. Whilst I did appreciate the costumes and the music from the trailer, I was rather skeptical even though the whole world seemed to be hyped for it. I suppose it was probably that gatekeepery feeling you get when your fairly niche hobby becomes popular suddenly. I also just felt like this film was entirely unnecessary, why do we need a movie about Barbie? (To make money, obviously.) I just couldn't imagine where the plot would go, either you make a film about Barbie the character, or Barbie the doll. Then I thought it would just be another one of those isekai/fish out of water comedies we've had a billion times before. I love the Toy Story series and The Lego Movie, to me those made more sense because they were animated. I was actually planning to wait for the Barbie movie to come to a streaming service, instead I eventually caved after seeing the Ken trailer and decided to go and see it.

Luckily, I found that the film was actually.... really fun! I had a good time watching it, so that's all that matters. It's just a harmless summer flick, so we don't have to analyse it deeply, right? Unfortunately for you, I am going to nitpick it in detail down below.

Hm... Maybe I'll start with the costumes and sets? There were a lot of easter eggs on the screen to find. I did love Barbieland and all the cute mini Dreamhouses, it really did feel like a place designed for dolls and not real humans. It seemed to me that a lot of the fashions and dolls featured were based more on pre-2000 Barbie, except for maybe Happy Family Midge and pooing Tanner. Seeing Tanner on screen made me laugh, I still have mine from when I was a child. I was going to say "I felt so nostalgic, that toy was such a big part of my childhood", but that's exaggerating a lot. I mentioned the doll that came with him somewhere else on this site.

Most of the dolls in Barbieland were called either Barbie or Ken. It's true that Barbie and Ken can come in many different looks, however it seems that the filmmakers mostly forgot that Mattel have made more than just Barbie and Ken. There were a few Skippers around, and of course we had Midge and Alan (who are supposed to be a couple but didn't even get any screentime together for some reason...), but where were Teresa, Christie, Nikki, Summer, Chelsea, Stacy, Raquelle and all the many other characters we've had throughout the years? I don't really know why Alan got such a big role, at least he was entertaining though.

My favourite scene, visually, was the disco scene at the beginning set to the Dua Lipa song I can't stop listening to. The dancing, the costumes, everything was wonderful! I did comment on the film's soundtrack elsewhere on this site, but I'll talk about it again here. My favourite track was clearly Dance the Night, it actually made me change my opinion on Dua Lipa entirely. I don't care for the Billie Eilish song, even if I didn't already dislike her, I would find the song boring anyways. Barbie Dreams grew on me these past few weeks. It's too short, I think, but still catchy and fun. It's weird how they had to credit Aqua, despite the fact that all they did was sample their song. Like I probably mentioned before, their label likely insisted on having the credit. There's also a Charli XCX track, it's really short also. I thought that it would be set during a car chase scene, since it's called "Speed Drive", however it isn't. This track is sort of cute and fun, although the lyrics, in my opinion, are rubbish. There were other pop songs there, songs that I can't remember so I'm not going to comment on them. (I will talk about Ken/Ryan Gosling's song later...)

I suppose I'd better talk about the main characters, Barbie and Ken. Margot Robbie is a good actress, and I think she did the role well. I just feel like Barbie in this film felt like some caricature of Barbie, leaning more into the blonde bimbo stereotype than what I personally grew up thinking of her as. Notice how I emphasise I, for other people she might be perfect. Barbie can be whoever you want her to be, as shown in this film where there are hundreds of different Barbies. Maybe I am a bit harsh, Margot Robbie's Barbie wasn't really a blonde bimbo, she did have character growth and she wasn't stupid, just slightly naïve. Perhaps I am too used to Kelly Sheridan's Barbie, who gives off a role model/big sister vibe. At least this Barbie is an adult, I prefer this to her being a teenager like she usually is nowadays.

It's funny that this Barbie gave her name as "Barbara Handler". Yes, that is the name of Ruth Handler's daughter, who the doll was named after, but shouldn't her name still be "Barbara Millicent Roberts"? Then again, this film is really about Barbie the Doll, now Barbie as a character.

Ken was one of the best parts of the movie for me. He reminded me more of Toy Story 3 Ken than Ken from the animated Barbie universe. Ryan Gosling was a good choice, I've never actually seen any of his other films, but I can say that he acted well here. One of the best parts of the movie was when he went all dude bro and took over Barbieland. His song was also amazing, I'm surprised he was the only character who got a dramatic musical number. Perhaps this film was originally meant to be a musical, and that's the only song that survived? I'm Just Ken was such a good track, not just the music but also the whole scene with the choreography and the colours was just super enjoyable. It was certainly another highlight of the experience for me.

Ken's outfits, like Barbie's, were all so cool! I would buy a doll of Ken in that fur coat, and I'd also buy the Ken Mojo Jojo Casa Dojo or whatever it was called. It's a shame that live action Ken only got one doll out of this. (EDIT: THEY EVENTUALLY DID MAKE A DOLL OF KEN IN THE FUR COAT!) It made me laugh that Ken's job was just "Beach", it reminded me of all those cheap swimsuit Barbies you can buy still.

There were other characters, they didn't leave that much of an impression on me though. Simu Liu Ken was funny, but apart from that the others were just OK. There was Lord Business or the CEO of Mattel, that mum and her daughter who could be seen as a Bratz reference, and... I just remembered there was also Weird Barbie. She was cool. I think everyone's seen a toy like her in their lives. It was funny how her legs were supposedly always doing the splits. Pregnant Midge was there, of course, but I think she was just there to say "Look how controversial this was! Isn't it funny, a pregnant doll?" Like I mentioned before, sometimes it felt like the director just looked up a top ten list of the most controversial and also most iconic Barbies.

The plot of the film.... It was OK, I suppose. It was a bit hypocritical how they made a joke about capitalism, considering what this movie is. You could say it's supposed to be an advert for Barbie dolls, but it's more just trying to sell Barbie "brand collaborations" than actual dolls. Jokes about capitalism are trendy nowadays, so it makes sense that they'd include one. There was quite a heavy feminism message throughout, it certainly wasn't very subtle. It was trying to be deep, but it didn't feel all that profound to me. Maybe I'm just too dense to understand these messages. It's funny because Barbie used to be all about pink and glamour and stuff considered stereotypically girly, which is what some feminists don't like. The popularity of this film means that "Barbiecore" is popular again, which is nice. I had a problem as a teenager thinking that it was bad to dress pink and "girly", so I'm happy that it's more acceptable to be unapologetically feminine again. Or maybe it always was fine to be that way, I don't know. I felt like some of the media these past few years has discouraged all that.

A lot of people got emotional during the ending bit with the Billie Eilish song, it had no impact on me. Then again, it takes a lot for a film to make me cry. Apparently this film is about girlhood or being yourself or the patriarchy or something, I don't know. All I can tell you is that this film was fun, and I smiled a lot throughout.

They're already planning on a sequel! What could it even be about? I'm not sure what more there is to tell now that Barbie (or "Stereotypical Barbie", to be precice), has gone off to the real world to be a real woman. I'm sure they'll figure it out somehow, this franchise is too much of a money maker to rest so early.

I realise that a lot of this page was probably quite negative. I find it a lot easier to explain why I dislike something than why I like it. Usually all I can say is "that was cool" or "that was interesting". When I like something, I just enjoy it, I can't explain why.



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