I appreciated your history and commentary! I think its evil genius to create a film, which, as you mentioned is a 2 hour advert we paid for (!), which mocks the (mostly) white, male management while funneling revenue to the real white, male management. Which waxes prolific about the oppression standards for women, while perpetuating them with cis, white, blond, uber skinny/tall Barbie. Mattel is getting kudos for being so profoundly diverse. You mentioned race (right?). They had one person in a wheelchair in one scene. They had one fat character. To me, that is more tokenism than representation. The Barbie movie USES feminist ideas to literally sell actual patriarchy in a way that is apparently invisible to most feminists. My feminist friends loved the flick. Well played, Mattel. It is a feminist hack. Mock the patriarchy (inside the patriarchy while perpetuating patriarchy!) All in a feel good, pink package! YAY!

what ab the black feminist movement?????? i know this was general but we can't just generally skip 40 YEARS, the black power movement, the combahee river collective, etc etc. there's no way the third wave of feminism started at the me too era.

Ruth Handler actually is the founder Mattel.

I went into this movie wanting something visually stunning and generally funny and feel-good, so I was satisfied, even if the "feminist" monologues felt pretty heavy-handed and I was confused what exactly Ken's epiphany was at the end. The very last line threw me off especially, since Barbie was excited to be real and the movie apparently underscores her realness by reminding us she has a "woman's" body now. But it's still a fun watch! I enjoyed it. Will watch again.

Hi Cheyenne! Thank you so much for taking all this time to provide a very thorough review! I watched the movie last night and partly liked it but also left with some question marks. It's comforting to hear that I'm not the only one! It was also enriching for me to hear your perspective as a black woman on it. My partner told me that he had read some reviews that the movie was too white and with this in mind I was actually surprised about the diversity. I loved that the president and nobel prize winner were both women of color. Also the mother and daughter duo as two important characters that actually educated and saved white, stereotypical barbie. I understand the wish and need for more diverse characters in lead roles and I also think that it was important to leave Barbie and Ken as white characters to show where conflicts are coming from. To show that the beauty of Barbie is a stereotype that lacks identification and representation of women (which the daughter in reality points out in her short cafeteria speech). The movie definitely lacked to go deeper into dynamics of race and priviledge and of course body diversity. I thought it was a shame that Barbie mostly got inspired to take action by her 'broken' feet and cellulite. Her proudly seeing a gyn and implying that she finally has genitals was a mini step into this direction but I would have loved to see her embracing 'imperfections' or rather just very normal physical phenomenons like cellulite or body hair instead of just showing that she now wears birkenstock (which in the end is probably the consumerist way of showing some form of body acceptance). And what you say about the impact of the movie: I am also not gonna buy Barbies now and I could imagine that the movie is an entire rebranding strategy to make young feminist mothers buy Barbies for their daughters and children eventually. Being pregnant right now, I am asking myself: how do I want my kid to grow up? Which games should they play, what influence do I want in their lives? With a new feminist image of Barbie, I could imagine that many young, feminist mothers will find the justification to bring the dolls and toys of their childhood back into their kids lives.

Barbie land wasn't very feminist if Ken takes their power so easily. You do a great review. In the end this movie was capitalism and just buy Barbie.

the not so covert celebration of Eurocentric beauty standards kind of got on my nerves a little, tbh that's probably the main thing putting me off from watching it lol. But regardless you're looking beautiful as always 😍😍😍

That movie made me laugh and cry a lot.

~11 min in. It wasnt the first time in history women could choose when to have kids. It was the first time in recent and specifically recent european history.

This thumbnail is soo good! You are a Black Barbie

looking like a black barbie !

Yes you aren’t going to buy a barbie doll after watching the movie but what about all the girls (and boys) under 8 years old? Maddels target audience (always has been, always will be) age 1 - 8. And what did you say about a mum liking watching her daughter play with a doll? What was the lesson learnt from this mother and daughter story?? Answer : if you get the mothers on board (approval) then you sell more barbies to more daughters. The reason why there was so much money spent on marketing for this movie, is to cleverly craft a new barbie narrative = sell MORE barbie dolls. Same shit, different day!

'Promo SM'

This movie felt a little strange as a trans girl. Like I don't know if there is a lot I could explain about it simply, but it was kind of awkward to watch. I enjoyed it. But it still felt weird.

@itscheyennecassidy

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I get that. Especially when Barbie wanted to see the gyno at the end. It felt off….

@hq4287

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@@itscheyennecassidy exactly x

@babydoll6280

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No it was spot on its not for trans women is the point. It's for natural born women.

@judelee9156

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​@@babydoll6280 barbie hates transphobia and so do the rest of us, go away

@goyavoyage

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Seconding that - it really felt awkward. I think it's partly because the whole movie never breaks a very rigid gender binary (and heteronormativity), which, you know, could have been expected, but just added to the vibe of "very simplified feminism fighting against a very basic understanding of patriarchy". Don't get me wrong, the movie still had an immaculate aesthetic and some good burns! But it still felt very... simple, really.