Movie Debate #147: Barbie

[Reed Rothchild | 9,545]

[RH | 4,910]

I’m going to have to think about how to put this on your scale.  
There’s a lot to unpack on this one. OTOH, there were plenty of nostalgia references that even I could pick up on because though I was 100% a pure, classic boy of the 80s and early 90s, we were all subjected to commercials for boys and girls, so there were plenty of references that I could get.  Also seeing Mattel being willing to reference the more insane toys they made like Midge was… interesting. I greatly appreciated “weird Barbie” too because, yes, every girl had one of those and even my daughter cut up a doll’s hair, messed it up and regretted it. It was a nice touch that I think women and girls of all ages could relate with.

But (and it’s a big but) this was the most preachy, self absorbed, one sided, political film I’ve seen in a very long time.  It loses a lot of points in my book for being so hyper-feminist, even though that was kind of expected.  I felt like it was also a big “commercial” from Mattel but instead of making Barbie some form of relevant kids toy with a fun story that was relatable too families with children, they decided to pander to the leftist, feminist clientele which, quite frankly, wasn’t probably much of a clientele before.

I was left wondering what the point of this even was, from Mattel’s perspective as I didn’t see how this could generate sales, even if it did improve their image with a feminist-type of person? 
Barbie has probably had a bad image from the vantage point of mainstream media and the left, but I’d assume your average Barbie consumer (as the one making the purchases) were people who’s political views fell in the middle-to-conservative perspective. 

As a brand, Barbie is an icon and since Mattel is a company that needs to make sales to turn profits and stay afloat, why would you disrupt your established bases opinion of you as a company? In this day and age, there’s a lot of pressure to pander to agendas, but I’m not sure that translates into sales when you isolate half a population, may inspire boycotts and all you’ll do is inspire a few brownie points with a group of people who will likely never buy a Barbie, even if their opinions of the brand change.

So, I did watch this film.  I watched it with my wife.  I did not agree with the agenda but I enjoyed the pop culture references and I could have a bit fun in between the eye rolls and deep sighs.

It was a “meh” experience at best, so I guess that answers my question on how to rate this.

Edited January 15 by RH

[Reed Rothchild | 9,545]

12 minutes ago, RH said:

I didn’t see how this could generate sales

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_films

[RH | 4,910]

Just now, Reed Rothchild said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_films

I’m not talking about the film, though that is a good point.  I don’t see how this could have boosted sales of Barbie Dolls.  Maybe it did, briefly, as some women might have connected with their youth and made a purchase-of-support for the message, but long term, this image doesn’t seem like a sustainable money maker for Mattel.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,545]

2 minutes ago, RH said:

I’m not talking about the film, though that is a good point.  I don’t see how this could have boosted sales of Barbie Dolls.  Maybe it did, briefly, as some women might have connected with their youth and made a purchase-of-support for the message, but long term, this image doesn’t seem like a sustainable money maker for Mattel.

You're theorizing that "right wingers buy Barbie dolls and left wingers watch this movie."

Most young girls and women are neither.

Also

 

[Reed Rothchild | 9,545]

Anyway, I'll go 6.5, but round up for @RH 

[wongojack | 215]

Provocative and interesting, but not quite a great movie.  I voted 7.

[doner24 | 1,196]

5/10 it was a decent watch, but got tiresome hearing a different version of the same joke for 2 hours. Nice performances and Margot is always nice to watch. 

[TDIRunner | 2,742]

Didn't see it.  Not going to. 

My wife saw it and actually took my boys to see it with her.  She described it as "just ok."

[Link | 2,714]

Ben Shapiro hated the "agenda" and most current use of that word is... let's call it "virtue signaling" for me. 

I thought the movie was fun and hilarious. The humor was right on target for modern times and was not a bad approach for selling toys to girls, nor for appealing to women who grew up with the female doll that led by example having so many varied careers and jobs in the undeniably male-dominated society. I didn't see anything political about it except in the opinion people who (even subconsciously) feel like men should be in power just by being men. Which... was pretty much the point. 

I thoroughly enjoyed it and give it 8 minimum here, voted 9. 

[Sumez | 2,965]

Haven't had the chance to see this one yet unfortunately  

But pretty much everything Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach have been involved with so far has been brilliant, so I'm sure I'll enjoy it!

 

  

10 minutes ago, Link said:

Ben Shapiro hated the "agenda" and most current use of that word is... let's call it "virtue signaling" for me. 

Ben Shapiro hating something should probably be considered a stamp of quality

Edited January 15 by Sumez

[fox | 1,667]

What a colorful, playful, and subversive flick.  It would have been so easy for this to be safe saccharin cash in given the source material.

If you hated this, you must be a Bratz or Monster High fan.

 

[nrslam | 476]

7/10.  Wasn't the best movie I saw last year, but it was top 5 for sure.  I'll likely watch it again at some point.

[Splain | 2,571]

I've actually seen this one! 7/10. This movie was cleverly written, and definitely written to be discussed afterward. SPOILERS BELOW.

I'm a man, so here's what stood out to me. Feel free to tear this apart, telling me I missed the point.

There's not a single intelligent man in the movie. They're all stupid. But we can all name movies that feature all men with only inconsequential/token women in them. So it's a fair point.

I've been testing the idea that women do not want any help from me. And it has actually improved my real-life relationships with women, not just my wife lol. Also, I already knew that nobody cares about my musical talents, I learned that in high school.

The biggest weakness for me was that the whole solution to snapping all the Barbies out of their "trance" was sitting them down and telling them things that are hard about being a woman. But these Barbie dolls have never experienced any of that in Barbieland. So it's just pausing the movie and venting to the real-life women in the audience. That's fine, it's just a weird part of the movie and not actually a solution to their problem. It could have been more effective at actually changing something in real life, unless the proposed solution really is to distract all men with dance-fights while women take over the government.

The other part that fell flat was the supreme court stuff. The Barbies tell the Kens that they're Kenough, basically "we as women aren't going to make any room for you, you have to be content with what you have. Find happiness in that." And then shortly thereafter, "No, you can't have any seats on the supreme court." Now, if that's supposed to mirror what men have been telling women throughout history, then that's fine, but it's subverted by the fact that there are many women on the US supreme court! Why dd they choose the supreme court to be the thing?? It's too easy for us to think "oh, but there ARE women on the supreme court, so we're doing pretty good!" The whole point of flipping the genders to make men upset is defeated by that, IMO.

The portrayal of Mattel was effective, talking about how there was one, maybe two female CEOs ever. It effectively shows that no matter how much a man says he respects and appreciates women, it's not a replacement for an actual woman CEO.

It's good to see that even though Barbie saw all the terrible things about being a woman, she still chose to be a real human, ending the movie with "being a woman is great" instead of "all men are garbage."

[Reed Rothchild | 9,545]

Continuing that train of thought, kind of...

I've been wondering what happens if the best song Oscar goes to one of the songs in this movie.  Not the Dua Lipa one, or the Billie Eilish number, or the Lizzo one, or any of the others. 

No, what if it goes to the Ryan Gosling number instead.

That will be some extremely meta shit. 

[Brickman | 3,992]

Never seen it and never will. Couldn’t imagine myself enjoying a movie about Barbie and Mattel HQ trying to create one big advertisement to drive sales of their toys.

I liked Lady Bird though. People should go watch that movie.

[G-type | 2,482]

On 1/14/2024 at 8:55 PM, RH said:

I don’t see how this could have boosted sales of Barbie Dolls.

Sales grew 9.3% to 1.92 billion

[G-type | 2,482]

I really enjoyed this movie. I thought it was funny and creative.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,545]

On 1/15/2024 at 11:18 AM, Reed Rothchild said:

Continuing that train of thought, kind of...

I've been wondering what happens if the best song Oscar goes to one of the songs in this movie.  Not the Dua Lipa one, or the Billie Eilish number, or the Lizzo one, or any of the others. 

No, what if it goes to the Ryan Gosling number instead.

That will be some extremely meta shit. 

...and we're halfway there 

 

 

[glazball | 169]

I enjoyed Barbie waaaaay more than I ever thought I could or would.  It had me cracking up quite a bit (especially "mojo dojo casa house" and Weird Barbie), and I'll happily watch it again one day.