Helga without the H

Every year* I attempt (with varying degrees of success and effort) to watch as many of that year’s Oscar nominees as possible. For the past few years* I’ve posted reviews of these movies here on this blog. At some point before the awards ceremony, I usually write up some sort of over-analysis and maybe some predictions, but we’ll see if I run out of steam before then. In the meantime, today we cover…

*Except 2022, when I was too burned out from 2021’s binge to give a crap.

Barbie

[8 nominations for best picture, supporting actress (America Ferrera), supporting actor (Ryan Gosling), adapted screenplay, production design, costume, and 2 songs]

IS IT SALTBURN? Even though you loved it, no.

Okay, it’s time for the review you’ve all probably been waiting for (just kidding- I know nobody is waiting on these things!) I’m not sure if I’ve ever experienced a movie that had more people seeing it and talking about it than the Barbie movie. Nothing has been this popular since Jurassic Park. Like everyone else I know, I went and saw this in the theatre, and was super eager to do it. Barbenheimer dragged me out from my covid all-streaming hermit lifestyle and back into the movie theatre for the first time in years. I liked this movie! I was funny and clever and looked great! But guys… I’m wondering… did we all see the same movie? This movie was no Jurassic Park.

Now don’t get me wrong, there was plenty to like here. First, like I already said, it was very funny and clever. I was cracking up at every moment of the Ken Discovers Patriarchy storyline. (Mini fridges everywhere, explaining The Godfather, feeling useless because his job is just “beach,” etc.) I absolutely adored everything about Weird Barbie. I appreciated the random cameo from Rob Brydon. And the way Barbie moved around her dreamhouse and interacted with the set had me chuckling. Speaking of the dreamhouse, I was in love with the attention to details, so mad props to the production department for, well, the props. My personal favorite was the ambulance that came to rescue Ken after he tried to be/do more than just beach. I also really liked the general concept and theme of this movie; I liked the emphasis on how much Barbie has achieved, given she’s worked every single imaginable job known to (wo)man. Oddly enough, in my upcoming novel (which I drafted WAY before ever hearing of this movie, for the record) I feature a society similar to Barbieland. Not pink and plastic and full of beautiful people, but a society where women are the ones with all the power. So, I dunno, great minds think alike, I guess?

But just because I, and everyone else I know, enjoyed the fun movie, does not mean that I think that movie deserves every Oscar. And it is NOT being snubbed, people!!! It is nominated for a boatload of Oscars, INCLUDING BEST PICTURE!!! Who whines that their mega-nominated movie isn’t getting ENOUGH nominations? Whiners, that’s who. People are mad that Greta Gerwig didn’t get a nomination. She did. For WRITING this madness, which is where the real magic happened. People are mad that the male actor got nominated instead of the female actor. But a female actor DID get nominated! America Ferrera is up for Best Supporting Actress! And I’m going to be totally honest here; NEITHER of those performers deserved their nominations. I’ve heard countless people say that “nobody else could play that Ken role but Ryan Gosling!” Inaccurate. PLENTY of actors could play that role. I love the shit out of Ryan Gosling, but he didn’t do anything particularly stellar here. As for America Ferrera- same thing. I tried to avoid any spoilers before going in, but one thing I couldn’t avoid was a flurry of posts and headlines fawning over her “big speech” that apparently had people in tears. “Oh man, can’t wait! Must be powerful!” I thought. Then it happened and I was like “This is it? WTF?” It was a too-on-the-nose lazy rant, and I don’t understand how something that generic came from the same mind that came up with Weird Barbie. And Ferrera’s delivery was fine, but… not for an Oscar. Did Margo Robbie deserve a best actress nomination? Maybe. She was very good. The question is, was she better than other nominees? Eh, some of them, sure. Better than Lily Gladstone and Sandra Huller in their god-awful boring movies and roles. But as good as Annette Benning? Maybe. As good as Emma Stone? Hell’s to the no.

While I very much appreciated the feminist messages and the self-effacing humor in this movie, I felt that the film still glossed over some elements of Barbie that I just couldn’t go along with. For one thing, almost nobody in BarbieLand actually looks like Barbie or Ken except for Margot Robbie and Issa Rae. If every woman in BarbieLand is Barbie, and every man is Ken… why don’t they all look alike? The actual dolls all look alike. Barbie’s only foray into “diversity” for the first few decades of her existence was to offer a brunetter version. Other races popped up in the early 80’s (including “Oriental Barbie” – oof!), but she still looked like the same exact doll just with a different dye in the plastic. Barbie didn’t start offering other body types until 2016, and when tall, petite, and curvy Barbie arrived. Only recently, in 2020, did they really expand to give us any real variety in Barbie’s appearance; we’re up to a whopping 9 body types. But take a look at Mattel’s dang website; these dolls still have the same dang identical eerily-symmetrical face!

But more importantly, the big problem that most Barbie critics, myself included, have had for decades, was Barbie’s emphasis on exceedingly unrealistic beauty standards. Particularly her body. No human being can physically look anything like Barbie (even Margot Robbie).. Mattel has made huge strides in recent years to make Barbie dolls more accurately reflect the real world. They’re up to 9 body types as already mentioned, as well as dozens of skin colors and hairstyles, but they’re also including dolls with prosthetics, skin conditions, and down-syndrome. This movie feels like a huge part of Mattel’s attempt at re-branding to get away from the laughably painful stereotype of the unnaturally sexy Barbie who is too skinny to menstruate. But while the film does a great job of helping stereotypical Barbie find her self-worth because she has no purpose beyond being pretty, it totally ignores the fact that little girls, partially thanks to Barbie dolls, feel worthless because they can’t be pretty and thin. All Barbie dolls are pretty and (too!) thin. Even “curvy” Barbie is somewhere between a size 6 and size 10 (depending on which article I read). For the record, I’m a size 8:

The movie just totally ignores all of this history. It pretends to be a great feminist flick, and has this (supposedly) great speech that even complains about the having-to-look-good-and-be-thin expectation placed on women.

“You have to be thin, but not too thin. And you can never say you want to be thin. You have to say you want to be healthy, but also you have to be thin. “

Meanwhile Mattel is yet to make an actual fat Barbie. Or an actual ugly Barbie. In the movie there is an actual overweight woman playing one of the Barbies, and we’re just pretending that’s BarbieLand. That is not BarbieLand. Stop pretending that is BarbieLand. In real BarbieLand, the “Curvy Barbie” looks like me (see above). Address the actual problem, Movie! Nobody was dismissing Barbie because she’s a woman or unemployed; we dismissed her because she was shaped like a FemBot and cared more about her dang appearance and ridiculous outfits than she did about whatever impressive-ass job she was working that week.

I’ve lost my train of thought. So I guess I’ll just stop there.

Point is, the movie is fun. But it ain’t worth a dang best picture Oscar!

PS: Barbie’s elbows are always stuck at 90 degree angles that make it nearly impossible to change her tops (at least that was the case in the 1980’s-90’s.) Why emphasize her permanently tip-toed feet and not her permanently bent elbows? Missed humor opportunity if you ask me.