Barbie

It's cute, it's funny and smart, it looks and sounds beautiful, but I felt like I'd seen it before. Rather than the copycat of The Lego Movie that the trailer smacked of, Barbie ends up reminding me of a run-of-the-mill but still more than good Pixar film. But I really like the campaign around the film, which for the first time in a long time (at least where I live, anyway) managed to get a lot of people excited about going to the cinema wearing something pink, from a baseball cap to a bathrobe, and just go have fun. That's good. (07/29/2023)

My daughter recently told me she was absolutely pink with joy that I took her to the playground. That phrase kept coming back to me as I watched this film, because it is essentially about the loss of joy, but pretends to be about something else. It's not grim philosophy, but a terribly simple and basic petty battle of the sexes. The sequence of sketches and funny scenes works well, including the great cast. The finale, however, is all about the fact that from a certain point onwards, the pink joy disappears and I'll have to watch it live, unable to do anything about it. (08/05/2023)

Barbenheimer, part 1. For the future of movie theaters, it's a blessing. In the current era of professional strikes, post-Covid suffering, and the domination of streaming services, two summer premieres have turned into a contrasting event that appeals to a wide spectrum of audiences. Professionals are slowly realizing that black-and-white / banal targeting of content to specific audiences like men / women / children is ending. Everyone goes to see Barbie wearing pink, and those who didn't sleep during lectures know how the relationship to this color has changed over the past hundred years (and will continue to change). Globally, this is a phenomenon over half a century old, so it is not surprising that Barbie has a large percentage of adult fans after 64 years, while children are just beginning to discover her. At the same time, it is the first live-action film after the era of 40 cartoons for the VHS, TV, and VOD market, so that is also a reason to celebrate. The soundtrack is pleasant, although some tracks make sense only after watching the movie. So what is the final film like? The trailers revealed a really large number of ideas, the style and humor were unveiled, and it seemed that there was not much left. Fortunately, smart marketing fooled us, and the film actually offers an additional message, and it is not just a showcase of how Greta Gerwig tried to reconstruct 30 classic motifs from the history of cinema, but it has emotional depth. Barbie's encounter with reality is unexpectedly brutal, just like Ken's journey toward patriarchy. The whole story is conceived as a fantasy quest spiced up with elements of a classic musical. And surprisingly, it works. What is the proof for something like this? Some feminist analysts are already dizzy from it all. I can't wait for Barbie according to Kate McKinnon to come out and proudly display her next to Malibu Stacy and Cynthia. If you're interested in the real world of Mattel, I highly recommend the documentary Tiny Shoulders, Rethinking Barbie (2018). (07/26/2023)

I didn't fall for it. At its very core, Barbie is as shallow and superficial as what it mocks all along. I can totally see the brainstorming sessions between the Mattel and Warner Brothers executives, in roundtables similar to the one Will Ferrell had in the film: "Hey, we need to boost the sales of our rubber dolls, how about we make some seemingly socially critical pulp fiction, wrap it in basic lessons about the workings of the patriarchy and the status of women in society, and just take a little dig at our corporation on the side to make it look self-aware to the naysayers of our product line.... ". Well, what comes out of a corporation making fun of corporatist? Yes, just corporate toothless humor, created on commission, and made to answer to those at the top who pay for it. PS: I'll slap two stars, for the opening (really funny) reminiscence of A Space Odyssey and then for the brief scene where Margot tells a naturally aged woman that she's beautiful. That's what the Botox princesses, led by Nicole Kidman, should be playing in a loop to light up their barbie heads. (12/13/2023)

Definitely a Meta film, a great financial success, playful and clever filmmaking, with an excellent Robbie and Gosling, great dance numbers and songs, good philosophical musings to ponder, enjoyable cameos and an originally conceived world. A few things are annoying and cringeworthy, but I surprisingly enjoyed it. The best part is definitely Barbie's trip to our world – it's a shame they don’t spend more time, as there were a few humorous interludes – but the patriarchy in Barbie's world had its moments too. Hard to rate, I don't need to see it again, but it entertained me. 65% (09/26/2023)