Barbie v. Oppenheimer: YOU DECIDE

[Clint_L]

I think Barbie was a great movie, don't get me wrong. But it doesn't compare to Oppenheimer in terms of the heaviness in any simple way.

Hmmm...haven't seen Oppenheimer but Barbie was all about some pretty heavy themes, if presented in a very fun package. I really enjoyed it - so did my spouse. Theatre was 80% women and my spouse commented that now I understood how they felt at some of the films I drag them to.

Greta Gerwig is 3/3, though for me this was her second best film. Lady Bird is a pretty high bar.

 

[Ondath]

Hmmm...haven't seen Oppenheimer but Barbie was all about some pretty heavy themes, if presented in a very fun package. I really enjoyed it - so did my spouse. Theatre was 80% women and my spouse commented that now I understood how they felt at some of the films I drag them to.

Greta Gerwig is 3/3, though for me this was her second best film. Lady Bird is a pretty high bar.

Absolutely it has some heavy themes. But my friends and I thought it fumbles its execution sometimes - some ideas are really well and subtly presented, like

Spoiler: Barbie spoilers (never thought I'd write that with a straight face)

the whole point about the patriarchy forcing men to define themselves through liking a girl or or horses or owning this or that is really good. I think it really gets to the heart of the problem in a way I wasn't expecting.

But other times the ideas are very shallowly presented and the way they're said really ruins their potential. Like

Spoiler: Barbie spoilers (seriously what messed up timeline wants me to preserve the surprise value of BARBIE?)

The solution being "get Kens to fight each other and go vote while they aren't looking" really didn't sit well with me. For a film that approached so many real world problems so subtly, the ultimate solution being "Pokemon GO TO THE POLLS" was a letdown.

In contrast, I generally dislike Nolan's political takes, but Oppenheimer is really even handed in discussing the titular character's communist ties, what that means when living under the Red Scare, and the nuanced existence of the man who invented the atomic bomb, was an egotistical womaniser but also felt his moral failings in every step of the way. The grace with which the movie handles its themes and thorny questions simply can't be compared with the Barbie movie.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

In contrast, I generally dislike Nolan's political takes, but Oppenheimer is really even handed in discussing the titular character's communist ties, what that means when living under the Red Scare, and the nuanced existence of the man who invented the atomic bomb, was an egotistical womaniser but also felt his moral failings in every step of the way. The grace with which the movie handles its themes and thorny questions simply can't be compared with the Barbie movie.

Arguably, it is infinitely easier to make a "serious" film that handles serious themes and questions than it is to make a Barbie movie that both is palatable enough to appeal to the the rights holder (Mattel) while also being funny and subversive.

That's not a knock on Oppenheimer, by the way. Simply stating that the degree of difficulty for Barbie was much higher.

 

[Umbran]

Hmmm...haven't seen Oppenheimer but Barbie was all about some pretty heavy themes...

Oppenheimer is about a real man enabling literal destruction of the human world.

 

[Ryujin]

Oppenheimer is about a real man enabling literal destruction of the human world.

And misquoting the Bhagavad Gita (or at least quoting from a very different translation than the ones that I've read).

 

[Ondath]

Arguably, it is infinitely easier to make a "serious" film that handles serious themes and questions than it is to make a Barbie movie that both is palatable enough to appeal to the the rights holder (Mattel) while also being funny and subversive.

That's not a knock on Oppenheimer, by the way. Simply stating that the degree of difficulty for Barbie was much higher.

Absolutely. It's quite impressive Barbie manages to get away with as many of the points that it does.

But Barbie and Oppenheimer just compete in different weight classes. And that's not a knock on Barbie in any way.

 

[Umbran]

Arguably, it is infinitely easier to make a "serious" film that handles serious themes and questions than it is to make a Barbie movie that both is palatable enough to appeal to the the rights holder (Mattel) while also being funny and subversive.

Generically, sure.

I dunno if it is easier to make a serious historical biographical thriller that gets $80 million domestic box office in its opening weekend, though.

 

[Stalker0]

But other times the ideas are very shallowly presented and the way they're said really ruins their potential. Like

Probably the one big "swing and a miss" for me on Barbie was:

Spoiler

When the Barbie's took back the government, they gave teh Ken's a "a few little rights" rather than full inclusion. Effectively providing the idea that women would be just like men given positions of power, that nothing really was learned.

It was to me the obvious chance to "do things better". Margot's Barbie, realizing how poorly she treated Ken, pushes for the Barbie's to "do better" and really give the Ken's a stake in things, creating the "perfect inclusive world" that Barbie was supposed to represent.

Instead it provides the message "to bring someone up, you got to keep someone else down"

There is also one scene in the movie that didn't work for me but did for my girlfriend. A scene where one character does a monologue talking about all the contradictions women have to go through. I personally found it a rough scene, it came across as very preachy and expository. Ultimately I thought other aspects of the movie did it better by "showing not telling". However, my girlfriend found that scene powerful and she really "felt what she was talking about". So ultimately its a reminder to me that I'm not really the target audience here.

 

[CleverNickName]

A scene where one character does a monologue talking about all the contradictions women have to go through. I personally found it a rough scene, it came across as very preachy and expository. Ultimately I thought other aspects of the movie did it better by "showing not telling". However, my girlfriend found that scene powerful and she really "felt what she was talking about". So ultimately its a reminder to me that I'm not really the target audience here.

Very similar experience here.

Now it might be true that I'm not the target audience, as you say. But I think the bigger takeaway for me was the realization that there are things that marginalized people go through every day that I (a cisgender heterosexual white male with a 401(k)) won't understand.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Generically, sure.

I dunno if it is easier to make a serious historical biographical thriller that gets $80 million domestic box office in its opening weekend, though.

Oppenheimer was tracking for ~$40 million until the whole Barbenheimer thing really took off.

This is a truly strange case wherein, for whatever strange synergistic reason, a mass culture phenomenon took off. Arguably, it had little to do with Oppenheimer, and a lot to do with the juxtaposition with Barbie.

Finally, the true irony of all of this is that the corporate backstory is that Nolan left Warner Bros., and apparently Zaslav "counterprogrammed" this by choosing a release date for Barbie that was the same as the one Nolan did ... purely to be a little petty. However, this strange pettiness apparently worked out well for everyone!


(To substantively respond, though ... I truly think it's much harder to put serious themes in an IP movie than it is to make a serious movie about the guy who headed the creation of the nuclear bomb. I mean ... you'd stumble on serious themes on that one just by accident.)