Let's talk about Barbie

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Barbie (2023), is a film that may surprise many for better or for worse, and I consider that the movie may be a little boring because of its humor that at first may seem very silly. Likewise, I don't think that children under 12 years old will enjoy it as much since it really doesn't look anything like those adventures of the doll that they are used to see in the countless animated films that have been made about the character.




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The show begins by showing us the colorful world of Barbieland, where all the dolls are named Barbie, the dolls are named Ken, and then there is Allan. The Capitol of this nation is pink, the houses are dreamy and pink, and the women are dressed in pink. It is clear that the main scenery is scenery, and all the accessories of the famous doll are shown, including Ken, (of course, we must understand that we are in a fantasy world that recreates children's games that included Barbie as the protagonist).


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In this idyllic world Barbies are presidents, doctors, businesswomen, judges, lawyers, engineers, astronauts, Nobel Prize winners, they are free to do anything away from that figure they call patriarchy.

In my eyes Barbieland is the kingdom of matriarchy, a utopia where all Ken are second-class citizens. An ideal Ken whose job, according to himself, is to play, (he is like an ornament on the beach), is obsessively in love with the Barbie doll and even gave me the impression that he was a stalker.

The perfect and ideal Barbie admires the other Barbies, likes parties and dance choreographies, bathes in a shower from which no water comes out, floats from her bed and drives her pink car. You can tell she likes Ken, but as a friend, which the doll doesn't like very much.


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Everything is perfect for the Barbies, but an anomaly occurs in which this ideal Barbie does not feel perfect and begins to have ideas about death, begins to suffer from defects like any human being (flat feet), her breakfast burns, cold water comes out of her shower, and she feels pain. Here the doll begins to become humanized and horrified.

To solve these problems she must go to the real world, which she achieves with the advice of the weird Barbie and her pink map that tells her how to get out; but before this worn Barbie presents her with two paths to choose: to continue with her life as before, represented by a high heeled shoe, or to discover the truth of the world, represented through a more comfortable shoe.

To get to the real world Barbie technically goes through all the fantasy worlds of Barbie, it is something worth seeing and that for those who do not know them will be funny but ridiculous. On this journey she is accompanied by Ken who is so obsessed with her.


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In this real world everything is dominated by the male sex, Barbie comes to feel sexualized and screams that she has no vagina, and Ken has no penis. The two separate looking for an answer as to what is wrong with her.

So will be Ken's insecurity that he gets excited, and feels important because a lady asks him the time, he is also impressed by figures like Rocky and Bill Clinton, presenting in him a crisis of masculinity so he investigates in the library what it is to be a man.




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Ken returns to Barbieland burdened by male stereotypes as he sees the real world way of life, and decides to set up a new patriarchal order called Kendom, where all the Ken's are now the ones who rule and matter. Barbies quickly take on the roles of maids, housewives and nice girlfriends.

Barbie on the other hand supposedly finds her owner, the young Sasha, who questions the doll as she has ceased to be a symbol of independence, who has stopped believing in her and accuses her of being a harmful example for society that promotes unrealistic standards of beauty and is also very superficial.


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However Sasha is not to blame for her existential crisis, but her mother, Gloria, who also has an identity crisis, and depression while working as a receptionist at the Mattel company on the other hand deals with the problems of her teenage daughter and her worries are transferred to Barbie.


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Barbie is captured by Mattel and its CEO, (a wasted Will Ferrell) and his all-male executive suite, which confuses the doll. She flees from them, Gloria and Sasha rescue her and the three decide to travel back to Barbieland together.


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In Barbieland our Barbie is already aware that girls hate her, that men control the real world, and she discovers that Ken has decided to establish the patriarchy in her idyllic world.

All this makes Barbie get out of control and have a nervous breakdown where she questions her own existence. While in the real world this depressed Barbie is selling very successfully.

But this Barbie who is already losing her stereotype plans together with her friends from the real world and some Barbies, (among them the weird one) and of course Allan, to overthrow the Ken.


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The dolls follow the advice of the real world, (with a lot of flirting in between), against those Ken dolls that are about to change the world known to them. The message here is one of empowerment and solidarity among women.

The Barbies plans start to work and after waking up the other Barbies, they manage to meet on the beach and ask the Ken to play the guitar, causing a confrontation, when they start flirting with other Kens different from the ones they had previously assigned, and take advantage of this distraction to recover Barbieland.

This idyllic Barbie continues to destroy Ken's heart, but gives him to understand that he is made for other things and not only to be on the beach and fall in love with her, finally Ken seems to understand that Barbie only wants him in the Friend Zone, but he is hopeful because he manages to feel useful to others.

The Barbies, now in possession of their world again, agree to let the Ken share it with them, but very cautiously and from very low positions in society.

The Matell executives who are chasing Barbie see that everything is in order and decide to close the portal that led them to Barbieland. Gloria, gives the executives an idea: the ordinary Barbie, mother, employee, and with daily problems such as dealing with their children and husbands, when they calculate that it could be a successful launch, they approve her idea.

Barbie, despite this victory, feels that something is missing, and suddenly Ruth Handler, her creator, appears and tells her that she can be whatever she wants, and what Barbie wants is to be human, with all the consequences that this brings, even if she has to go to her gynecologist and wear comfortable sandals to cure her flat feet instead of always wearing high heels. The doll becomes an ordinary woman and thus loses her immortality, but gains humanity.

The Barbie doll for many people is a capitalist model and consumable product, although the original object of its creator was to oppose the obsolete belief that girls only dreamed and played with strollers, baby bottles and plastic babies.

Ruth Hander's approach was to completely transform the ways of playing and, on the other hand, to make girls' imaginations sail into unknown territories, a modern, independent and successful woman.

The girls fantasized about being adults and having a career, something that in the late fifties was still shocking.

Things went a bit awry as feminist groups saw Barbie as a sexist object that degraded women, reducing them to the superficiality of the pink world in which they lived and that also promoted materialistic values that induced consumerism.

Allan is the only man in Barbieland who distinguishes himself from Ken, being an outcast because of his character and personality, as he does not want to be like the others and feels comfortable being who he is. In the 60's he was a doll who was Ken's friend, but was discontinued to avoid any homosexual connotations.


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All of these ideas run through the film along with the concepts of patriarchy, matriarchy, femininity, sexism, social acceptance and a reminder that true happiness lies in accepting oneself.

The film is very cinematic with multiple references:

  • 2001 Space Odyssey, The Shining, Dr. Strangelow. All films by Stanley Kubrick.
  • The Godfather Trilogy by Francis Ford Coppola.
  • John Badham's Saturday Night Fever.
  • Grease by Randall Kleiser.
  • Zack Snyder's Justice League.
  • Tony Scott's Top Gun.
  • Singin' In The Rain by Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen.
  • Busby Berkeley and his musical choreographies.


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The song Push by Matchbox-20 sung by Ken and a song by the Indigo Girls called Closer to fine.


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Barbie stars Margot Robbie, Ryan Goslyn, Simu Liu, Ariana Greenblatt, America Ferrera, Kate McKinnon, Emma Mackey, Will Ferrell, Issa Rae, Michael Cera, Rhea Perlman, Dua Lipa, Alexandra Shipp among others and Helen Mirren is occasionally the narrator. And I forgot a fact, Doctor Barbie is played by Hari Nef; American actress, model and trans activist.

The film is directed by Greta Gerwig, and written by herself and Noah Bumbach, it stands out for being very colorful and pop, the amount of ideas it throws at our eyes and senses is immense. Within its silly and colorful packaging it is a very cult film that has turned out to be a box office success, being the public caught en masse by the immense marketing around it.

It entertained me, and also managed to give me that extra something I wasn't asking for from this production. I can understand that some might not like it as they were expecting a more childish film. Now for having seen this movie as a family I have to discuss many issues with my wife and my 20 year old daughter and that is an invaluable and rare merit in these years that movies serve us everything on a silver platter and chewed.

Additionally, I appreciate the visual break we were offered by not overloading the film with CGI.

I hope you liked my opinion, and go see a movie that I have the intuition will soon become a cult film.

Thanks for stopping by, and a big and cinephile greeting.

Posted using CineTV



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