Review of the film “Barbie”

Self-published essay, Aug. 8, 2023

So, I saw Barbie. It was not my idea. I was basically told I had to go. My step-brother, Marcus, got a Jean-Paul Sartre vibe watching the trailer. I, on the other hand, was skeptical about the whole thing. When we went to see Oppenheimer, we ended up seeing the Barbie trailer and to me it looked like it would be a two-hour pink nightmare. I remember thinking to myself, “That is going to be two hours of crap movie.” I was wrong. I am embarrassed that I prejudged the film this way. However, I am 51 years old, and I know very well that some art is simply not intended for me. And the popularity and endless media coverage? There is no way something that popular is good, right? It’s why I read the first two “Harry Potter” books; I just had to know what was going on. So, I was amenable to seeing Barbie, though I don’t think I had much of a choice. I did have demands: a slice of pizza at Sbarro, popcorn, plain M&Ms, and we had to try this new Mexican seafood restaurant afterward. My demands were met; I was going to see Barbie.

I settled in with said popcorn and plain M&Ms and a ridiculously large Coke Zero for what I assumed was going to be a rather long two hours. And then about ten minutes into the movie, Barbie makes some point about logic and causality that is straight out of a logic textbook. “Wait, what??” Did she just say that? Maybe this film is not what I expected. I started paying closer attention. Then the film tips its hat to Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, which offered another “Wait, what??” moment.

The film is a riot of pink and pastels, for sure. And the opening dance sequence I found portentous. However, the film was not what I had assumed it was.

In the film, Barbie seems to be malfunctioning (cellulite! flat feet!), so she goes into the real world to find the girl who is playing with her and presumably messing her up. It turns out she is not malfunctioning, and it’s not a girl, but a middle-aged mom who works for Mattel.

Barbie is disenchanted with the real world, and discovers that Ken, who joins her on her mission to the real world, has gotten the wrong idea about it, and assumes that the way to finally get Barbie’s attention is through toxic, obnoxious masculinity—which he takes back with him to Barbieland.

I say Barbie is disenchanted, because she finds the girl whom she assumes is the reason for her malfunctioning, and the girl is underwhelmed. Barbie encounters a table of high school girls eating lunch and presents herself to the girls, expecting to be adored and showered with affection. Nope. The girls verbally destroy her. They say Barbie is BS. “We played with you when we were five.” They say she’s nothing and represents about as much. Barbie is hurt and bewildered. She is convinced that Barbies have empowered young girls—you can become a scientist or an astronaut!—and that the Barbie concept has empowered girls. But, the girls are quick to disabuse her of this notion, saying that Barbie is a toy that represents unreal beauty standards and was manufactured by a corporate entity. The girls at one point call Barbie a fascist.

This is not what Barbie was expecting. Did Barbie dolls not empower young girls to want to become Nobel laureates? But, this is not the point, and the film makes this very clear. All this empowerment talk is nonsense. It does not speak to the girls’ lived experiences. The problems that girls and women encounter in this society are systemic. And systemic problems cannot be addressed with empty symbolism. Saying young girls can become doctors does not help young girls in the here and now. It does not help them navigate the oppressive, reductionist culture in which they live. And this empowerment message is delivered by a skinny, beautiful, blonde toy? The high school girls eating lunch are right: Barbie is nothing and represents nothing.

I found this interesting. The Barbie movie is not a celebration of the Barbie doll. It’s a deconstruction of her. I would go so far as to say the Barbie movie is not about Barbie dolls.

There are some hilarious scenes at the Mattel corporation. The CEO, played of course by Will Ferrell, is an absolute imbecile. Incidentally, all the men—specifically the White ones—in this film are imbeciles. I found this refreshing and quite frankly delicious. This, I suspect, rankled among many conservative commentators. They would like America to become great again (“great” here meaning White, male, Christian, and heterosexual). This film is downright subversive. It’s a rebellion. It is challenging (threatening?) to the systemic status quo.

Upon leaving the Mattel corporation, there is a sequence that I cannot imagine the filmmakers did not have The Matrix in mind when they created it. Barbie enters a seemingly endless, sterile hallway and then walks through a door and is delivered to what looks to be your grandmother’s kitchen. There, Barbie encounters a woman whom I kept thinking of as the Oracle in the Matrix. It is the woman who designed the original Barbie doll—Ruth Handler, played by Rhea Perlman. They have an interesting conversation, and the scene serves as an inflection point in the story. Barbie is changing.

So, Barbie makes her way back to Barbieland, defeated. She feels broken and ugly. Barbieland has become a macho, man-fueled mess. Everything is going wrong. Oracle Ruth appears again and she and Barbie (again) enter this Matrix-like, all-white nothingness and have another fruitful conversation. Barbie basically channels philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre and talks about how she doesn’t want to be a pre-established product any more. She seeks agency and freedom to define herself. This is what the film is about. I thought about Rousseau’s concept of “perfectibility” here. And this is what Barbie is seeking. Not to become perfect, but to develop, to become more than what she is. To become.

The film is about people developing and evolving, which of course requires a space in which to do so. One thinks of classical liberal thinkers like Wilhelm von Humboldt, who views the state as a possible creator of this space—while posing the greatest threat to it. This gets back to the systemic considerations of the film. Telling young girls they can become scientists is an empty symbolism. The thought of becoming a scientist or a novelist is fine and dandy, but women who become scientists do so in a dreadful cultural context. They are judged—by men—according to extremely narrow, suffocating standards. In the film, the actress America Ferrera delivers a monologue on the absurdities that women have to contend with: you have to be skinny, but not too skinny; you have to be pretty, but not too pretty; you have to be the boss, but not be too much of a boss. Women are damned if they do, damned if they don’t. Feminist philosopher Luce Irigaray observes, “And the woman? She ‘doesn’t exist.’ She adopts the disguise that she is told to put on. She acts out the role that is imposed on her.” So, being a scientist is great and everything, but it’s a lot less great under these oppressive circumstances.

And the Kens are idiots, yes. But the main Ken (played by Ryan Gosling) undergoes an evolution as well. He lives for Barbie’s attention. He is an empty vessel. This calls to mind Karl Marx’s thoughts that a repressive system like capitalism creates alienation in everyone—even the capitalist. So, this culture is relentless and unjust toward women, yes, but men cannot achieve their potential in such a climate either. As Mary Wollstonecraft says, “Virtue can only flourish among equals.” All are affected. Ken realizes he, too, has to live his life as a free human being, and not as someone who desires external validation—from a person he views in a reductive way.

Men should see this film. I suspect many guys will watch the trailer and say “Like hell.” But you have to get past the pink silliness. There is a seriously intelligent film here. I do not much care about the Academy Awards, but if someone is going to hand out a Best Picture award, it might as well be Barbie. The film is extraordinary and most humane. And if folks don’t like it, I find that suspicious. Like I said, the conservative bellyaching was unsurprising. Their priorities are, well, fascist. How is seeking America to become White, Christian, and heterosexual different than Nazism? I would ordinarily shy away from such blanket statements, but if a person hates this film, they are (I suspect) an ugly human being. They are indeed malfunctioning.