(Spoiler alert!) In a nutshell, Barbie (2023) opens with an extended cut of the parody of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). The narrator introduces us to the utopic ‘Barbie Land’. Every day is a marvelous day for Stereotypical Barbie and the other Barbies. Here, feminism thrives, with a female president, an all-women supreme court, female artists, female workers, etc. of various shapes, sizes, and creeds. But the myriad of Kens in Barbie Land are like second-class citizens, all of whose lives revolve around the Barbies.
Source:- https://www.barbie-themovie.com/
The protagonist Ken and the rival Ken are constantly vying for her attention. One day, she finds herself in an unusual position – thinking of death, from her feet sitting flat on the ground to her thighs developing cellulite. Weird Barbie illuminates that these are a direct consequence of the girl playing with Stereotypical Barbie. So, Barbie and Ken set out on a journey to the Real World to find her owner and change her thought process, where they are then caught off guard by the unexpected reversed gender roles. The concept of Barbie as a role model to young girls does not hold true anymore, while Ken discovers patriarchy and admires it. While Barbie is captured by Mattel (founder company), Ken brings patriarchy to Barbie Land and soon spreads male supremacy until Barbie Land mirrors Real World, resultantly dissembling the women-led government and performing patriarchal brainwashing. Barbie, along with Gloria (the woman who owns her) then hatch a plan to free all Barbies and reclaim her kingdom.
One of the central themes that it touches on is Patriarchy. The movie, with its whimsical sense of humor and satirical tone, pokes fun at the imperious patriarchal way of life and tickles the audience’s funny bones. The CEO of Mattel is taunted in myriad ways.
The boardroom of Mattel’s headquarter (being ‘only’ men) unamusingly applauds itself for having had ‘two’ women CEOs since its establishment. The audience too is teased in subtle ways. In response to a montage of Kens mansplaining to Barbies, the narrator quotes “Pretend like you don’t understand the Godfather and men love to explain it to you”, expressing men’s obsession with the patriarchal figure and ideals of the film. Or, when the narrator made another mansplaining joke by name dropping Lou Reed in connection to the Pavement (indie rock band). Or, when one Barbie is woken up from her earlier conditioning (or should I say slumber), she quotes “It’s like I have been in a dream where I was really invested in the Zack Snyder Cut of the Justice League”, hinting on the online display of toxic masculinity by Snyder fans those of whom were dominantly men.
Source:- https://theconversation.com/kens-rights-our-research-shows-barbie-is-surprisingly-accurate-on-how-mens-rights-activists-are-radicalised-210273
It’s no surprise that the movie addresses Capitalism and other intertwined affairs like consumerism and post-modern leisure subculture. And herein lies the pinnacle of Barbie-core that is going on around social media. Mattel trademarked the term ‘Barbie-core’ in 2022 and has since collaborated with many companies and more so recently, to market the glamourized signature Barbie ‘hot pink’ color across multiple products and facilities, ranging from vacation rentals like Airbnb, video-game consoles like Xbox, clothing brands like Balmain, Aldo, and GAP, beverage company like Swoon, fast-food chains like McDonald’s, make-up brands like NYX and OPI, oral care like Moon, utility brands like Beis Luggage, and so on. This material culture of Barbie (doll) along with its symbolistic trajectory has amplified its longstanding contribution to mass consumption.
Now let’s take a deep dive into the history of Barbie to bring to light the doll’s collusion with consumerist culture. Inspired by her daughter (Barbara) who used paper dolls to imagine the adult-figured dolls, Ruth Handler introduced the concept of Barbie dolls to the American toy market in 1959. It represented a break from traditional infant dolls and offered girls life choices beyond motherhood. Playing with Barbie thus becomes a form of resistance.
This has been represented in the opening scene of the movie when the narrator quotes: “Since the beginning of time, since the first little girl ever existed, there have been dolls. But the dolls were always and forever baby dolls. The girls who played with them could only ever play at being mothers. Which can be fun, at least for a while anyway”.
But there is more than a grain of truth to this, to which the narrator mocks, quoting “She might have started out as just a lady in a bathing suit but she became so much more. She has her own money, her own house, her own car, her own career. Because Barbie can be anything, women can be anything. And this has been reflected back onto the little girls of today in the Real World. Girls can grow into women who can achieve everything and anything they set their mind to. Thanks to Barbie, all problems of feminism and equal rights have been solved!”
While some believe that Barbie discourages traditional gender roles, and fosters independence and resistance, others are of the opinion that it promotes heteronormativity, creates mental health issues, and commemorates capitalism. This is epitomized in the scene where Sasha (a teenager) calls Barbie out saying: “You set the feminist movement back 50 years. You destroyed girls’ innate sense of worth and you are killing the planet with your glorification of rampant consumerism… I am powerful until you showed up here and declared yourself Barbie, I hadn’t thought about you in years, you fascist!”
This holds true only partially if viewed from a myopic lens. But if the historicity and trajectory of Barbie are looked at more exhaustively, it isn’t difficult to spot that it reeks of internalized misogyny. The first phase (1959-1963) was characterized by Barbie’s image of empowerment in terms of career or sexuality. The second phase (1964-1967) was predominated by cookware accessories that signaled the conservative idea of motherhood (nurturing figure).
As a matter of fact, Ken as Barbie’s love interest was introduced to satisfy consumer demands, so as to prepare young girls for the future. The third phase (1968-1984) saw a huge shift in Barbie’s representation, illustrated by politicized wardrobe and negating the ‘homemaker’ identity. Coincidentally, Barbie’s newfound personality with extensive stylistic distinction – psychedelic prints, bright colors, and short mini-skirts paralleled the 60s Mod that stressed women’s agency and sexual liberation (Blitman, 1996). Further up till the 1980s, in times of Ronald Reagan’s Presidential victory, Barbie embarked on a shopper persona and returned to her domestic/leisure-seeking persona. The fourth phase (the 1990s onwards) saw a rise of anti-Barbie collections including ‘Feral Barbie’, ‘China Girl Baby Barbie’, ‘Gothic Barbie’, ‘Satire Nun Barbie’, etc.
Therefore, Barbie as a figure cannot be isolated from the context in which commodities were/are consumed. The symbolic meaning that Barbie embodies has been acquired through many social contexts as well as the social sentiments that Mattel has tried to encapsulate in its commodities. To some, it may be ‘liberating’ or what some coin as ‘cultural icon’, while to others, ‘degrading’ or what they label as ‘bimbo feminism’. The Barbie movie, being made with Mattel’s approval and marketed extensively worldwide, is in fact a commercial project designed for a broad audience that effectively exudes the very spirit of consumerism.
However, this new era of Barbie's persona that Greta Gerwig has crafted is pleasantly acclamatory. We know that Barbie has existed for over 6 decades. She’s an 11-and-a-half-inch 19-year-old, who has lived to become everything from an astronaut to a president to a Nobel laureate to whatnot, but one thing she hasn’t been until now is ‘existential’. Barbie’s existential crisis, one with physical manifestations, is juxtaposed with Ken’s fragile masculinity. With a hard-hitting monologue given by Gloria (that captures the very plight of womanhood in a patriarchal society) it goes on to show that Barbie too has agency when we allow ourselves to have that agency – meaning that Barbie can represent both the best and the worst depending on who uses her.
Speaking of ‘agency’, it is noteworthy here to acknowledge one of the central themes of feminist film philosophy that Barbie (2023) actively participates in - the critique of the ‘male gaze’ and emphasis on the ‘female gaze’. The majority of filmmakers and the like in the film industry are dominated by men. This, in turn, perpetuates a narrow perspective of women (objectification, sexualization) and other harmful stereotypes. Greta Gerwig has dramatically (the good kind) re-evaluated the representation of Barbie in pop culture and explored dynamics like gender roles and stereotypes, power imbalance, and even visual culture (the hot pink phenomenon). On both professional and personal levels, Greta has a knack for creating/exploring complex (and relatable!) female characters, just like the characters of Lady Bird (2017) and Little Women (2019).
Last but not least, with a genuine reflection of modern womanhood, she demonstrates how Barbie is not a static figure, but one that’s constantly evolving, as complex as it may be. At the same time, she playfully jests the trifle complications of human life and concludes with a note that we can get the best of both worlds, provided we do not box ourselves up in senseless binaries. Barbie may not appeal to all viewers but it may help someone forget how cruel the world is for women to exist as women, with the countless expectations and its accompanied unheralded performativity.
Article by:- Arshia Ningthoujam
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