Movie Review: Barbie

The latest in a series of films based on products from the world of children’s toys, the new film Barbie proves to be something of a remarkable achievement on a par with other groundbreaking examinations of female empowerment such as Thelma & Lousie (1991).

Director Greta Gerwig delivers more of the masterful storytelling she did with films like Lady Bird (2017) and Little Women (2019), but there is something wholly unique and original in Barbie that borders on brilliance. Throughout the film, Gerwig never lets the fun drag or get out of hand, or derail into silliness as it might in some other filmmaker’s hands. Instead, this is played as an earnest tale of female independence and is even more powerful for it. This is, to date, possibly the most important film based on a toy ever made.

Written by Gerwig and Noah Baumbach (the two previously collaborated on Baumbach’s 2012 feature Frances Ha), the film is a full-on examination of one woman’s existential crisis and her journey to achieve the independence and garner the respect she so richly deserves. But the film is also a deft social commentary that skewers such topics as gender identity, the idealization of beauty, and other perceived social stereotypes with razor-like focus and even more deadly satirical wit. Even the voice of the narrator (provided by Helen Mirren) gets in on the fun declaring that it’s impossible for Barbie the product to represent “every” girl when her embodiment in the film is provided by someone as beautiful as Margot Robbie. In short, this is a film so aware of what it is doing, it feels many steps ahead of itself throughout.

As the titular character, Robbie delivers a tour de force portrayal that deserves more than a passing note of achievement. There is real depth to this performance that perhaps wouldn’t have been possible had it been in the hands of a less gifted performer. Similarly, Ryan Gosling does a fine job as the over-masculinized “main” Ken obsessed with Robbie’s Barbie.

As Gloria and Sasha, the mother/daughter pairing charged with bridging the Barbie universe and the real word, America Ferrera and Ariana Greenblatt mesh effortlessly with one another to create one of the more believable parent/child relationships put to film in recent memory. It is a testament to their work, as well as that of other performers – such as Kate McKinnon (as a “damaged” Barbie), Will Ferrell (portraying a bottom-line obsessed Mattel CEO), or even Michael Cera (as the oft-forgotten Allan) – that gives the film the resonance that it has.

Ryan Gosling and Margot Robbie in “Barbie.” Photo by Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures/Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures – © 2023 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Work done by cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto to capture the vibrant colors and production design of Sarah Greenwood, as well as the impeccable art direction provided by Andrew Max Cahn, elevates the cultural achievement that the film ultimately is.

In a summer movie season that has provided very little in terms of memorable entertainment, Greta Gerwig’s Barbie proves an undeniable triumph and a wholly entertaining enterprise worthy of being labelled a masterpiece of the rather limited genre of films based on toys, if not in its own right.

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Mike Tyrkus

Editor in Chief at CinemaNerdz.com

An independent filmmaker, co-writer and director of over a dozen short films, the Editor in Chief of CinemaNerdz.com has spent much of the last three decades as a writer and editor specializing in biographical and critical reference sources in literature and the cinema, beginning in February 1991 reviewing films for his college newspaper. He was a member of the Detroit Film Critics Society, as well as the group's webmaster and one-time President for over a decade until the group ceased to exist. His contributions to film criticism can be found in Magill's Cinema Annual, VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever (of which he was the editor for nearly a decade until it too ceased to exist), the International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, and the St. James Film Directors Encyclopedia (on which he collaborated with editor Andrew Sarris). He has also appeared on the television program Critic LEE Speaking alongside Lee Thomas of FOX2 and Adam Graham, of The Detroit News. He currently lives in the Detroit area with his wife and their dogs.

@miketyrkus

Mike Tyrkus

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