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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]What I liked about the movie: Amazing costumes and set design. Ryan Gosling was very good and stole the show in every one of his scenes. Loved the nod to the original inventor. In particular, going back to Gosling but really masterful by Gerwig, liked the subtlety of Gosling’s performance and how he straight-up owned how women are relegated to arm candy roles reflective of the man in most movies.

What I didn’t like: Exhaustingly preachy to the point where I thought Gerwig must think her audience has the intelligence of an eggplant. Condescending tokenism in the Barbies. Relationship between mother and daughter was very stereotypical and shallow and therefore plot development on that point felt contrived. In general both mother and daughter were depicted as what a Millenial thinks Gen Z and Gen X are, and they didn’t ring true. Perhaps controversially, thought the last line was stupid, and sad. [/quote]

Spot on, though I didn't mind the shallowness of the mother-daughter characters or relationship because I think if they'd fleshed those out, it would have detracted from what I think the movie did best, which was create hilarious and believable Barbie and Ken characters who were actually grappling with what it means to be a Barbie and a Ken. The one area I think could have been better in this respect would have been to better develop the relationship between Robbie's Barbie and America Ferreira's character, since ultimately that was more significant than the relationship between mom and daughter. But I think they made the choice to focus more on Barbie and Ken, because Gosling was SO GOOD in that role, and it's hard to argue with that choice.

Agree the end kind of sucked, both the stuff with Ruth (I really hate that line about mothers standing still so their daughter can see how far they've come -- BS martyr complex motherhood that I have no interest in) and the way they ultimately resolved Robbie's character.

I agree with the tokenism criticism EXCEPT that I thought Issa Rae and Hari Nef were both great in their roles and neither of those examples felt like tokenism to me at all even though the casting was. I think they really failed on the question of Barbie and body image and I feel like they used Sharon Rooney's character to sidestep that question in a really hamfisted way. There's never been a Barbie that actually looks like Rooney or Nicola Coughlin who briefly appeared, and everyone knows this, and yet they want us to just pretend for the sake of the movie that this isn't the central criticism of Barbie? Come on.

But I'm actually willing to forgive a lot because of how great the Ken storyline is and how much a lot of the emotional core of the movie resonated with me. I absolutely cried during America Ferrera's monologue about how impossible it is to be a woman, even though I've heard that exact diatribe before, because it's just very true. And I thought the way they handled Barbie's experience in the "real world" and how her experience so thoroughly changes when she's no longer in a place where her personhood, independence, and intelligence aren't just assumed, was pretty resonate. These aren't profound points, but using Barbie to make them was a stroke of genius, and I think Robbie did a good job with it even if her performance wasn't as showy as Gosling's.[/quote]

I’m the PP. Love the discussion!

I agree with some of what you wrote, disagree with some. For instance, I do think Hari Nef did well with a tokenized role, but that’s partially why I found the last line so sad. Like if you are going to at least try to allow Nef to shine, why then fully repudiate that by making it clear that Barbie becomes a Real Woman because of what is now presumably between her legs.

Totally with you on the BS mother martyrdom line. Eyeroll-worthy. I also think you are totally right on the body image handling. It was hamfisted.

I disliked America Ferrera’s monologue, though she is a fantastic actress and I thought she did a great job with weak material. It was part of what I thought was too preachy and tedious.

I think you are probably right that the shallowness of the mother-daughter relationship could have been to prioritize the Robbie-Gosling scenes. That’s a good point. Ferrera is just excellent and I think she could have made it work with more screen time, so I think you are correct. [/quote]

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