Who would Barbie vote for? The question is senseless, but, given the moment and given the film, even appropriate. On paper, and perhaps somewhat thoughtlessly, his thing is to assign him the conservative ballot. After all, few toys embody in such a precise and blonde way the entrepreneurial and highly capitalist success associated with an idea: goodbye to baby-faced dolls, hello to the aspirational image of adult women, of independence, of beauty, of happiness and, obviously, of the most brilliant global triumph. But, wait, Barbie included all forms of diversity in her catalog a long time ago with the declared intention not only of expanding the market (which, obviously, is always the case) but also of doing it in step with new times that include the word patriarchy among its demons to overcome. And it is then -and more so if the color of each centimeter of props that surrounds it is pink- that it is possible that the doll in question votes for the left. It is so. Let each one value it, we are already in times of reflection.
It almost certainly never crossed the mind of director Greta Gerwig that the premiere of her film would coincide with a general election in a tense and distant country such as Spain. But life, like the world, takes those turns and here we are with a strange comedy that puts a good part of our most passionate obsessions on the screen. And there precisely the success, the provocation and, where appropriate, even the manifesto.Barbie It is a film to enjoy, to discuss, to get angry at some other moment and, above all, to be surprised that such a bizarre excuse as the longest advertisement ever imagined (with permission from Air) becomes a true delirium as enjoyable and perplexing as it is intelligent.
the director of Lady Bird y little women he faces production as if it were the biggest challenge. The idea is to transform something as obviously dispensable as a tape about a doll into a film that is not only dispensable but perfectly aware of its dispensability, worth the anacolut. And it is in that game that is known game where Greta Gerwig’s proposal wins integers. The first sequence gives a clue. Suddenly, the mythical image of the monkeys and the monolith from ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ appears not so much parodied as milimetrically copied. The girls, tired of being mothers, with their baby-dolls suddenly discover that it is much more fun to play at being perfectly empowered, with everything (the good and the bad) that this entails. This time the monolith is not god but Barbie. Bright.
It tells the story of a being in an unreal pink world where everything is perfect. Or so it seems. Or perfect for each and everyone who lives there. We are in Barbieland and there the dolls rule, the dolls are smart, the dolls dance, the dolls know no contempt or belittlement. They, all the dolls named Ken, on the other hand, suffer what it would be said that women suffer where Barbieland is not. But not that much either. After all, they know nothing more than their secondary nature in a game that is not theirs. It is what has not so much the matriarchy as the barbiarcado. One fine day something happens. The protagonist thinks about death and that causes her to be forced to change worlds (from the unreal to the real, to ours of men) to try to find out the origin of her existential misery.
With this script written by four hands by the director and Noah Baumbach, Barbie It offers a beautiful mirror maze in which it is easy to see and lose yourself. Is it us or are they just dolls? Is he telling us about what’s wrong with us or is this some new Hollywood trick to make us think about something else and spend our money on more toys and more blockbusters? The idea isn’t revolutionary or even captivating, but let’s face it, it works like clockwork. The only drawback is found in the film’s effort to be brilliant with every step it takes, ironic in every glance. At times, he exhausts so much self-recursive joke, that is, about himself and his mechanism.