Director: Greta Gerwig
Distributor: Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.
Duration: 114 minutes
Barbie (Blu-ray) – Movie Review
Barbie has been winning over the hearts of young girls since 1959, and the iconic doll still seems to be as loved as ever. There have been so many versions of the iconic plastic woman, some a bit more peculiar than others. Over the years, Mattel has also produced several animated movies, some of which are also still rather popular nowadays. We were surprised, however, when a live-action movie was announced that would star Mattel’s leading lady. After a few colorful trailers, we were rather intrigued by the live-action movie, and today we’ll be taking a closer look at the film’s home release.
Barbie (Margot Robbie) lives happily in Barbie Land, together with many other Barbies and Kens. One Ken (Ryan Gosling) in particular has the hots for Barbie, and he does everything to try to get closer to her. Barbie, however, is more committed to giving everyone a fair share of attention, and she simply enjoys slumber parties together with the other Barbies of Barbie Land. While everything seems perfect, things get shaken up when Barbie suddenly has an existential crisis, and because of the sudden negative thoughts, she is deemed defective. She no longer wears high heels comfortably, she is experiencing other physical discomforts, and her line of thought is a lot different from all the other inhabitants of Barbie Land. The only solution for her is to go to the real world to find the girl who is playing with her doll persona, and only then everything could get fixed. Ken decides to sneakily tag along.
Once in the real world, Barbie and Ken realize things are a lot different here. People aren’t happy all the time, not all women are in power, and Ken discovers a little thing called the patriarchy. What ensues is an adventure where Barbie tries to fix all wrongs, while Ken is starting to get drunk on the idea of having power over everyone else in Barbie Land.
Barbie doesn’t hold that many surprises. The plot is clearly intended to steer towards a happy ending, even if it’s not the one that a lot of viewers probably hoped for. The movie raises a lot of problems in our current-day society, but it does so with a lot of flair and humor. Even though some subjects depicted here are not lighthearted in nature, the movie doesn’t take itself too seriously and often jokingly highlights certain issues. While not every political message landed well or was accurate for that matter, the messages that did land were done so with a lot of grace and humor. The movie contains quite a bit of meta-humor as well, which is certainly amusing for older viewers. We perhaps would have loved to see around ten minutes being shaved off of Barbie’s current runtime, as there actually isn’t that much going on throughout the film. Don’t get us wrong, however, the set and costume designs were nailed to a tee, and the atmosphere was perfect from start to finish. Even so, the movie does perhaps dilly-dally during certain scenes, losing its otherwise great momentum.
As a whole, the acting performances are very good in Barbie. Of course, the star duo of Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling are the highlight of the film. Both play their doll-turned-human personas so well that it’s very amusing to see their characters (d)evolve. Margot Robbie perhaps shows the biggest range in terms of acting in Barbie, as she goes through so many emotions and situations. Supporting roles also bring their respective characters to life perfectly. We do have to mention that we would have liked it if Will Ferrell’s character was fleshed out a bit more.
The Barbie Blu-ray version comes with quite a few bonus features. Most of these features are between 5 and 10 minutes long, and they handle different behind-the-scenes footage. You’ll get to learn more about the costumes, the soundtrack, the overall shaping of Barbie Land, and so much more. While there’s nothing groundbreaking to explore here, the additional content does add quite a bit of value to purchasing a physical copy.
Conclusion
Barbie is a very amusing film for young and old, and it does contain a few interesting political messages that deserve to be highlighted. This vibrant flick knows when not to take itself too seriously and the humor is often great as a result. While we don’t necessarily agree with every political remark in the movie, as there are some hyperboles in play, these messages never stand in the way of an otherwise quality movie experience. We would have perhaps liked a few scenes to be a bit more condensed, but we can easily recommend this one for a fun evening watch.
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