Director: Greta Gerwig
Writers: Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach
Stars: Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Issa Rae
Synopsis: Barbie suffers a crisis that leads her to question her world and her existence.
It was July of 2019 when Greta Gerwig was first announced as the director and co-writer – alongside her partner Noah Baumbach – of an upcoming film about the renowned children’s doll, Barbie. At that time, the world was in a much different place. No one could have expected that a global lockdown would happen within a year of this announcement, forcing everyone on Earth to put their careers, relationships, and lives on hold. It was the darkest of times and through some media made during it (Bo Burnham’s Inside for example), it showed how many people had to question whether to give up or keep fighting. It was during these dire times that both Gerwig and Baumbach sat down to work on the script – the first one they had co-written since 2013’s Frances Ha – and from it came what many actors who signed on to the project called, “the best script they had ever read.”
Barbie begins with Helen Mirren narrating over a magnificent homage to Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey informing the audience of what Barbie represented: a change in women’s history. No longer did young girls have to play with baby dolls trapped in the sole role of serving as a mother, and now these girls had the ability to dream and be whoever and whatever they wanted to be. Barbie was never just about a doll, but an idea poised to reshape the mindset of children worldwide. She could be a mother, if you wanted, or she could be a doctor, lawyer, teacher, or even the president. The idea of women having a sole purpose in the world was torn apart and in its place was a new world where anything could be possible.
This world of Barbieland was a perfect society run by women and for women, and it is in Barbieland where we first meet Stereotypical Barbie (Margot Robbie in one of the most fitting roles of her career). This Barbie is the most generic in that she is the basis of what Barbie was meant to be. She wakes up in the morning – already beautiful of course – waves to her friends and gets ready for the day before floating down to her car and heading off to spend a day in Barbieland. She doesn’t have a specific job like some of the other Barbies in the city, but she loves everyone and spends as much time with the people around her. This sometimes includes the Kens of the city including the prominent Ken (played perfectly by Ryan Gosling, and also who will be the central Ken of reference unless stated otherwise) and his foil Ken (Simu Liu), but for Barbie, Ken is more of an afterthought than anything. Everything is perfect, as it always is, until during a blowout party at Stereotypical Barbie’s house, she brings up the question of if anyone ever thinks about dying – something that is far out of the realm of possibility for everyone in Barbieland.
This first thought has a ripple effect through Barbie’s everyday life – her shower is cold, her waffles come out burnt, and worst of all… her feet are flat to the surface of the ground. This prompts her to visit a Barbie that spends her days getting destroyed and put back together again giving her a strange look and prompting her name, Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon). Weird Barbie informs her that every Barbie has a person on the other side playing with them and that for Stereotypical Barbie, her person is feeling a sense of pain and sadness that is now rubbing off onto her. Weird Barbie informs her that the only way for her life to return to normal is to venture into the Real World and find out what is causing her person pain, and help them resolve it.
She, and Ken who initially hides away in order to come with her, journey into the Real World, but even upon arrival it is clearly not what they had intended. Basically the opposite of Barbieland in every way, the pair find out that in the Real World, men are the ones in charge and women are seen as objects. This is something that piques his interest, as for the first time in his existence he feels seen on a broad scale; it’s also something that fills her with fear and anger as, for the first time in her existence, she is seen for what she is not who she is. As Barbie is searching through her memories to find the person who needs her the most, Ken heads off to discover what this world truly is, and what he winds up learning is just how male-dominated it is. Feeling a new sense of power, he heads back to Barbieland taking his newfound discovery of the patriarchy with him, while she continues her search that takes her to Mattel, the company that distributes the Barbie doll.
The Mattel executives have dealt with this situation before and plan to put Barbie back into her box, but she escapes, leading her to Gloria (an excellent America Ferrera) and her daughter Sasha (Ariana Greenblatt) who travel with Barbie back to Barbieland to find that it has been overrun by the Kens, brainwashing all of the Barbies in the process. Barbie, Gloria, Sasha, and Weird Barbie all must devise a plan to overthrow the Kens, save the Barbies, and reclaim their world.
Between remakes, spin-offs, adaptations, and IP, film nowadays is losing its originality more than ever. However, if there is anything Greta Gerwig has proven over her four features as a director it’s that she can take a project or an idea people might think they know, and alter it in such a way that feels more personal than 99% of media being released every day. From a directing standpoint, she has always been an actor’s director (which makes sense given her background as an actor herself) but with Barbie, she expands her gaze even further as she is able to swiftly move between a variety of upbeat scenes, whether it be a dance sequence, car chase, full-on action/war/Ken off, while also maintaining the intimacy that made her previous two films (Lady Bird and Little Women) so appealing to audiences. Her framing and attention to detail not only in making sure the impeccable production design by Sarah Greenwood is fully utilized but that Jacqueline Durran’s impressive costume design gets time in the spotlight, proves her ability behind the camera, and continues to show her growth as a filmmaker.
However, it’s the script – which feels like more of a collaborative effort between Gerwig and Baumbach than I had initially assumed – that truly excels in finding the balance between absurdity and humanity. At times, Barbie is the funniest film and most insane film of the year. With direct references to both toxic masculinity and fandom, pop-up music and dance numbers, Mattel itself, as well as other corporations, and some of the most clever lines of dialogue of the year, this film could have been a full-on comedy and worked perfectly fine. Nevertheless, as both Gerwig and Baumbach know how to do so well, there is genuine pathos, and whether it be Barbie’s journey of self-discovery or Ken’s of self-deprecation, the theme throughout of not only being who you are and that being enough but about not letting your pain define who you are, instead allowing it to be one of the many things that makes a person human, brings genuine emotion that is both unexpected and fully earned.
Leading the film, Margot Robbie continues to prove why she is one of the most interesting actors working. The journey that she goes through during the film is elevated by her commitment to the role, and to bringing something different and unique to this character. America Ferrera delivers the best performance of her career, including a perfect and showstopping monologue that will likely be one of the best single-scene performances of the year. However, it’s Ryan Gosling, who is one of the funniest actors in Hollywood, as Ken that truly steals the show. In one of the most perfectly cast roles in the history of cinema, Gosling sings, dances, and commits himself to the role in a way that is at times hilarious and other times sincere in a way that only he can. Ken longs for the day that Barbie will want him and through childish outbursts and two pairs of sunglasses to hide his pain. He longs to be appreciated, loved, and seen as someone who is good enough. Displaying all of this, Gosling delivers a career-best performance that works on every level and one that deserves awards consideration as one of the best performances of the year.
As Barbie is coming to a close she is given a choice, and through Billie Eilish’s masterful song “What Was I Made For?,” the themes and ideas that encompassed the wonderfully paced hour and fifty-four minutes are discovered, and all of the questions that she had are finally answered. Ever since she first hit shelves in March of 1959, Barbie has always been perfect. She had a perfect look, many perfect jobs, perfect friends, a perfect boyfriend, and overall a perfect life. But the idea of Barbie was never about perfection, but about the hope that a small piece of plastic could bring to an imperfect world, and the possibility for every little girl to be able to tell their own story. Greta Gerwig’s masterpiece will forever be remembered for using one of the most recognizable brands in the world to show that imperfection and uncertainty are what really make life worth living, and your story worth telling.
