Barbie Night
February 2024
We gathered and discussed the blockbuster “Barbie” movie and all the complexities of the film….
Barbie's body: Most of those who played with Barbies felt little impact at the time as far as living up to her body type - we just used our imagination, many described her intricate relationships with other Barbies and other dolls. One person said she even had a Barbie with a degenerative neurological illness who could not get out of bed! Another remembered a great romance with a "Michael Jackson Ken" and another had many flings with GI Joes :) - However though we were not aware of it as kids, many agreed there was most likely a subconscious impact - she set this unrealistic ideal for a woman's body. Did you know if she were life-sized her waist would be 16 inches, smaller than her head? And she'd only have room for half a liver and a few inches of intestines? We felt as much influenced by characters like "Chrissy" on Threes Company and other TV shows.
Barbie was apparently meant to show little girls that they could be anything - most agreed that we did not get this message from the line of dolls. And our memories were not of all the career Barbie's anyway, most Gen X women (and older) just played with Barbies in different outfits. We think the career Barbies were released later and now are sold to our own daughters' generations. So we did not get the "you can be anything" message.
There were a lot of perspectives (all over the place) on America Fererra's actual speech - out of place in the movie/cheesy/repetitive/brilliant/beautiful/too heavy handed/ and yet the pervasive view was that the bulk of the message is 100% true. And we agreed that we impose many of these messages on ourselves ... we are not good enough, we need to be thin but not too thin and not say you want to be thin, you have to never grow old, never be rude, never get out of line, always be grateful, everything is your fault, we tie ourselves into knots so people will like us...
We discussed the whiteness of the movie - and of Barbie in general. We discussed how it is hard for little girls of color to see themselves in the original Barbie. Could Greta Gerwig have done more to address intersectionality? - black, trans women, etc. There were lots of supporting roles but we agreed it would be like trying to boil the ocean for the movie to take on more themes/goals/messages - there is just not enough time.
One of the most beautiful parts of the movie was Barbie's journey of becoming human. A few noticed that over the course of the movie, Margot Robbie's clothes and hair got progressively less "perfect" and fancy, her hair flatter, her clothes more plain. And that after you take an actual Barbie out of the box you can never put her back in the box - she's forever altered and no longer perfect. Kind of like being human. Have we accepted we are all just human?
Wish we'd had more time to cover Ken and his journey - we did discuss ways that men and our sons have unrealistic expectations of their own in today's world. Are they "Kenough"? :) There is a lot for boys and men to relate to as they try to find their place in the world.
We loved that the ending was about Barbie becoming human and not about her walking away with Ken into the sunset - and loved the OBGYN appt at the end to really hammer home her humanness and vulnerability.