Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling are a pitch perfect pair in ‘Barbie’
By Dana Barbuto/Boston Movie News
After earning six Oscar nominations for “Little Women,” Greta Gerwig turns her attention to littler women in “Barbie,” a story based on those iconic 11.5-inch, perfectly proportional polyurethane playthings.
In directing a script co-written with her partner, Noah Baumbach, Gerwig presents a “girls-can-do-anything” tale that kicks toxic masculinity in the balls. But, please, don’t call it male-hating. The movie is so subversive and clever in its takedown of “the patriarchy” that it can’t be reduced to a mere battle of the sexes. Both genders get their comeuppance. There’s plenty of “Kenergy” to go around.
If you’ve seen her on the red carpet at the movie’s premiere, you know Margot Robbie is the perfect Barbie. Yes, she looks like a living doll, but her performance is far from plastic. Robbie brings out her character’s humanity, hitting a range of emotions, jumping from frivolous fun to existential crisis without scuffing a pink pump.
Barbie lives in Barbieland with all other versions of the doll, such as doctor, news reporter, scientist, lawyer, veterinarian, even a president Barbie, played by Issa Rae. Barbie’s friends Skipper and Midge, who’s pregnant and “discontinued,” also show up. The Barbies run their world, but the Kens steal the movie. Namely, Ryan Gosling, all bleach-blonde and spray-tanned. Ken’s job is “Beach.” Not lifeguard, surfer, or diver, just “Beach.” He does “Beach Offs,” too. Ken is ga-ga for Barbie, fending off competition from a rival Ken played by a terrific Simu Liu (“Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”). Gosling’s best moment (among many) is the musical number “Just Ken,” a sad-boy power ballad (“I’m just a Ken, anywhere else I’d be a 10”). Shortlist it, Oscars.
Ditto for set decorators Katie Spencer and Sarah Greenwood, whose Barbieland is a visual feast of eye-popping color, populated with life-sized recreations of the doll’s cars and Dream Houses. The latter is nicely outfitted in hot-pink spiral slides and heart-shaped beds.
Every night is girls’ night; every day is the “best ever,” full of songs and smiles. Until it’s not. Something happens in the “real world,” and Barbie must fix the “rip” between the two realms, or else she’ll be saddled with cellulite and flat feet. The script sends her to Los Angeles with Ken tagging along. While there, she connects with a teenager (Ariana Greenblatt) and her mother (America Ferrera), an assistant to the head honcho of Mattel, played by a game-for-anything Will Ferrell. When he gets wind that there’s a rogue Barbie, he sends the goon squad to put her back in the box. Except, no one puts Baby in the corner, right? That’s a reference to a different movie, but the same thinking applies here. No one boxes up Barbie. She’s a woman on a mission.
Meanwhile, Ken gets schooled in the manly pursuits of the “real world,” unleashing a new world order when he returns to Barbieland. Suddenly, it’s Ken-dom, a “bro-culture” haven teeming with Foosball tables and “brewski beers” served by beautiful Barbies, resigned to watch “The Godfather” while the Kens mansplain the finer points of Coppola’s masterpiece.
Helen Mirren narrates a pre-title scene inspired by “2001: A Space Odyssey,” displaying young girls playing with old-fashioned baby dolls until a giant Barbie appears. Doll carnage ensues, as the children destroy the toys. Then, Mirren informs that when Barbie came along, she fixed “all problems of feminism and equal rights.”
“Barbie” in all its pink glory could have been straight camp, but Gerwig is having none of that. Instead, she roots the story in the pressures of modern-day womanhood, while lampooning everything from consumerism to conformity to gender politics to parenting. There’s almost too much going on, which is my main quibble. Nonetheless, Ferrera delivers a fantastic monologue (a male critic pal called it a tirade …just saying) about how it’s impossible to be a woman. Her performance might spur you to leap from your seat and clap in solidarity. If it hits you the wrong way, just remember, this is also a world where a beefy John Cena is Merman Ken. So, take it with a grain of salt. Now, can we all just “Beach”?
‘Barbie’
Rating: PG-13 for suggestive references and brief language.
Running time: 114 minutes.
Director: Greta Gerwig
Writers: Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach
Cast: Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, America Ferrera, Will Ferrell
How to watch: In theaters Friday, July 21
Grade: A-
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