Barbie's Live-Action Debut: Fun and Thoughtful

Release Date：Jul/21/2023

Genre：Adventure/Comedy/Fantasy

Director：Greta Gerwig

Cast：Margot Robbie、Ryan Gosling、Ariana Greenblatt、Helen Mirren、Will Ferrell

Viola's Rating：8.1

Way before its release, a bunch of commercials and social ads for Barbie were all over the place. As the trailer only reveals the comedic side of the feature film, it’s easy for people to see it as a popcorn film. However, although it’s not just a popcorn film, it does provide some food for thought.

As the first live-action flick of Barbie after a large number of computer-animated films and TV series, Barbie is an adventurous fantasy comedy based on Mattel’s Barbie fashion dolls that tells the story of the adventure Barbie (Margot Robbie) takes after she suffers a crisis that leads her to question her existence and her world.

Although all the commercials, marketing strategies and social ads before Barbie’s release seem very shallow just like the stereotypes people have of Barbie, this motion picture successfully discusses equality instead of feminism as the core value with the appearance of a popcorn film as a disguise. For a long time, Barbie fashion dolls have received criticism for creating false expectations and imaginations of girls and women, and Barbie provides a totally different perspective to look at it.

Irish novelist Cecilia Ahern’s short story collection Roar introduces 30 stories of struggling women. One of the short stories is “The Woman Who Was Kept on the Shelf,” and the traditional concept of Barbie falls into this category. Barbie is a doll sold in a box, and Barbie Land, which we see in the trailer, is perfect, but what happens when she comes to the real world? 

Every character in Barbie symbolizes a type of person in the real world. Since Barbie is the protagonist of the movie, she’s the one who’s going to have character development and a heroic arc with the most growth. The deep humanity and what Barbie has learned are heartfelt. As the tagline says, “She’s Everything. He’s just Ken.” Actually, there is more than one “Ken.” Kens represent people who don’t truly understand who they are, and their values depend heavily on Barbie’s attention and warm gazes. Not to mention that there’s still Allan, who is introduced as Ken’s buddy. No one wants to be a sidekick, but only when we truly love ourselves first, we’ll be able to find the true meaning of our existence.

With the abovementioned themes covered, Barbie seems a little bit serious. However, since it’s a comedy after all, it blends satire and social commentary, and the best part of the picture is that it keeps all aspects and elements of the “toy sides.” All the dolls are “hollow and plastic” in a good way, and dreamhouses and iconic outfits are included, giving nostalgic audiences a familiar atmosphere.

All in all, Barbie is an amazing feature film with a brilliant director, decent casting, fantastic costume design, gorgeous production design, etc. Reintroducing an existing IP, Barbie is one of the most creative, fun but at the same time serious films.

Picture Credit: IMDb