The Barbie Movie is Matriarchal Utopian Fiction

Rating: 4/5, good

I might be a little late to the party on this one, but it’s still polarizing so I want to explain why I liked it overall. This review will have spoilers because I’m assuming the people interested in watching it have already seen it by now.

I thought the Barbenheimer trend was a lot of fun. I liked that people were celebrating a mashup of femininity and masculinity with Barbie and Oppenheimer premiering the same weekend and all the memes and cosplay that accompanied that. It felt like a big bigender pop culture moment that was exciting for me as a genderfluid person so I was primed to like both Barbie and Oppenheimer. I don’t know if I ended up loving either, but because of the hype at the time they mean more to me as symbols of mass gender curiosity than they do as individual movies.

There’s some debate over whether the Barbie movie is feminist or not. I would say it is feminist because it shows patriarchy as real and damaging, sisterhood as important, and women as capable and universally beautiful. I would say it’s on the edge of being too overt with its political messaging. It takes a Buzzfeed-feminism-like tone at times which can be a little grating, but it doesn’t bother me that much because it matches Barbie’s bold, upbeat attitude.

I believe the thesis of the film is that Barbie can be empowering for many girls and women, but she’s just a toy and can only do so much. It starts by comparing Barbie to baby dolls and saying that Barbie inspired girls to grow up to live for themselves (by glamorizing career and fashion) and not only in relation with their husbands and children.

Barbie was invented in 1959 and her creator, Ruth Handler, said that at the time there were no adult dolls for her daughter to play with, so she picked up a Lilli doll while on vacation in Germany to use as inspiration. Lilli was a witty, sly, sexy comic book character and her dolls were marketed primarily to adult men as gag gifts. Handler submitted a Lilli doll to Mattel, the toy company that her husband co-founded.  

Now this is where things get a little weird… how did a sexy funny doll marketed to men end up being a hit with little girls? Well, it’s actually quite simple… Barbie is pretty and she has a lot more imaginative possibilities than baby dolls.

Part of the argument for Barbie being feminist is that she celebrates conventional femininity: she embraces makeup, clothes, and fashion. She’s the opposite of a more traditional feminist character like Daria who eschews conventional femininity as shallow. Barbie as a feminist icon is sex-positive: her sexy feminine look doesn’t take away from her capabilities as she achieves in many different careers. Barbie is both pretty and successful, neither cancels the other one out.

On the other hand, Barbie’s sexy look has always made her a bit controversial. I never had Barbies growing up and I don’t know if I would buy my hypothetical daughters Barbies unless they said they wanted them because I’d worry that they might start wanting to wear sexy clothes too early (apologies to Barbie fans, you may not see Barbie’s typical outfits as sexy but I do and it is somewhat up to interpretation).

The modern feminist thinking on women’s dress is that women should be able to wear whatever they want and it shouldn’t necessarily be interpreted as “sexy” but as self-expression. I don’t think any way of dressing invites sexual harassment, but I think certain types of dress invite the viewer to see the wearer as sexy, not necessarily as a potential sexual partner, but in a way that makes an aesthetic appeal based on enhancing the appearance of one’s body.

I have some experience with dressing “sexy” and how men respond to that, so I don’t do it very often. Some of the time I feel I can handle it or I think the look is worth it, but I would discourage my hypothetical daughters from doing it because I don’t know if they would be prepared for the reaction. It would be a judgment call based on how old/mature they are, how sexy the outfit is, what the context is, etc.

On a moral level, it’s better that the collective culture change so it’s no longer acceptable to sexually harass people based on how they dress, but on a practical level, it’s often easier for individuals to dress more modestly so they’re less likely to be sexually harassed. It’s easier for me to change my behavior by dressing modestly than to expect all men to change their behavior to not sexually harass me if I wear something sexy. I definitely appreciate those who dress sexy and clap back at people who harass them, but I don’t really have the bravery or mental acuity to do that myself.

And of course dressing modestly isn’t a guarantee of safety, some people will be creepy no matter what a person is wearing. Everybody has their own approach and comfort zone when it comes to dress, so it’s a very personal thing within the wider culture.

The Barbie movie actually addresses the issue of women’s dress and sexual harassment pretty well. In Barbie world, the Barbies can wear appealing clothes without worry, but when Barbie goes to Venice Beach, she feels self-conscious as men stare at her. She even gets groped by a man, punches him, and then gets arrested for defending herself. This clearly shows the contrast between matriarchal fantasy and patriarchal reality. I think this is a good way to critique Barbie and show how she has not in fact solved patriarchy as the Barbies in Barbie Land believed.

I suspect the sexy clothing being feminist idea may have something to do with why some older women were not fans of the Barbie movie. Maybe they grew up with Second Wave feminism (60s-80s) which was more against the sexualization of women, and millennials like myself grew up with Third Wave feminism (90s onwards) which viewed femininity and sexuality as empowering. People sometimes use the terms sex-positive and sex-negative to delineate between the two camps. The Barbie movie is definitely a product of Third Wave sex-positive feminism. I don’t really have an opinion about whether that’s a good or a bad thing, but that’s the type of feminism the Barbie movie seems to be following.

Besides the issue of Barbie dressing sexy, the other thing the doll is often critiqued for is encouraging girls to adopt an unrealistic ideal body image. Barbie is tall and skinny with an hourglass figure and large breasts. Sasha, the sassy teenager, calls this out: “You represent everything wrong with our culture. Sexualized capitalism, unrealistic physical ideals…” “Sexualized capitalism” could be taken to mean that capitalism exploits women’s bodies to sell unnecessary objects (sex sells). The movie never addresses this criticism, in fact it does the opposite by creating more dolls and outfits for Mattel to sell. As for the “unrealistic physical ideals”, I don’t think the movie addresses this issue very well.

Barbie is very sweet. She sees an old woman sitting on the bus bench and says, “You’re so beautiful.” The woman replies, “I know it.” I thought that scene was really touching because our culture sees older women as invisible and assumes they must have a low opinion of their appearance, so I thought it was inspirational to see an older woman be confident and proud of her appearance. I’m not sure if the intention was to talk about her inner beauty or outer beauty, but either way, that made me tear up a little.

By having Sasha blame Barbie to her face for how she was created to look right after Barbie is super sweet to an old lady, the Barbie movie evades having to deal with the issue of Barbie’s effect on young girls’ body image and makes Barbie more sympathetic. Barbie, as the embodiment and not the designer, can’t be held responsible for the way she was designed. I can’t speak from experience here, but I can imagine if there were girls out there who adopted Barbie as their ideal body image and how that might have led them to develop body dysmorphia. The Barbie movie doesn’t ever address this, perhaps because it’s too dark and the movie is trying to go for a finely balanced bouncy/bittersweet tone.

Barbie’s relationship with Sasha is a little underdeveloped. Sasha and Gloria (Sasha’s mother) help Barbie but Barbie doesn’t do much to help them back. It would have been a little trite, but Barbie could have given Sasha a makeover and helped her see her unique beauty and style or something like that. I think the movie wanted to spend more time on humor and action, so it didn’t get very deep into character development.

Speaking of action, I think the weakest part of the movie was Will Ferrell as the CEO of Mattel. I didn’t think any of the lines he said were very funny, but I’m generally not a big fan of Will Ferrell’s style comedy so that’s not too surprising for me. The whole Mattel part of the plot felt shoehorned in and not natural. I think they just needed it to get Barbie back to Barbie Land. I guess it gave it some action, but I didn’t find those sections very interesting.

Something that I thought was a little inconsistent about Barbie is that she told the old lady on the bench that she was beautiful, but later when Weird Barbie comes to literally lift her out of her depression with a hand up, Stereotypical Barbie calls her ugly: “I’m like you now. Ugly and unwanted.”

Why does she think she and Weird Barbie are ugly when she thought the old lady on the bench was beautiful before? Is it because the lady on the bench had real human experience? Is it because Barbie was feeling depressed so everything looked worse to her? Was Barbie just being nice to the woman on the bench and didn’t actually believe that she was beautiful? It’s not really clear.

Maybe she thought the old woman was beautiful because she won’t be there forever (evanescent, like cherry blossoms, although the movie shows a pine tree in that scene, so maybe it’s a comment on strength and timelessness?). The Barbie movie touches on the  theme of mortality, from the catalyst for Barbie’s fall from plasticdom: “Do you guys ever think about dying?” to Ruth telling Barbie near the end, “Being a human can be pretty uncomfortable… Humans make things up like patriarchy and Barbie to deal with how uncomfortable it is.”

In that scene with Ruth before she disappears it shows home movies of people who the melancholy music and fuzzy camera effects imply aren’t there anymore. Barbie has a Pinocchio arc in the movie where she learns what it means to be a real woman. She even becomes a real woman at the end and is hilariously excited to go to the gynecologist. She says, “I want to be a part of the people that make meaning, not the thing that’s made.” She wants to become a subject, not just an object.

One line I didn’t like was: “We mothers stand still so our daughters can look back to see how far they’ve come.” I could see how older women would cringe at that since it’s kind of insulting to imply that women stop moving forward in their lives or stop fighting patriarchy once they reach a certain age.  

Actually, Gloria does get something from Barbie. In a roundabout way, she gets to pitch her idea for an Ordinary/Just Mom Barbie to the CEO of Mattel. At first, he turns her down, but then his lackey tells him that it will make Mattel a lot of money and he agrees. This is interesting because Barbie’s typical brand is very aspirational, but maybe modern consumers want a doll that’s more relatable.

I felt kind of torn about Ken. I love the epic “I’m Just Ken” power ballad and the joke about his job being “beach” (not lifeguard, just beach). I think if the filmmakers were trying to make Ken an analogy for a trophy accessory female character they made him a bit too pathetic and needy and not desirable enough. They also gave Ken a lot more subjectivity and sympathy than a female character would have in that role. Ken takes up a lot more of the screentime and gets more characterization than Sasha, which is a little odd for a movie about a brand that caters to little girls. The movie seems to prioritize the Mattel characters over the non-Mattel characters, which kind of makes sense, as it’s goal is to promote the IP, but the real life characters get sidelined as a result.

On the other hand, maybe it’s good that Ken was based more on Ken the doll than a pure analogy for an accessory female character. The filmmakers succeeded in giving Ken an interesting arc for finding himself outside of his role as boyfriend to Barbie as well.

I didn’t quite understand why Ken was obsessed with horses or why he said they were “men extenders” (it makes them taller?).

I’m also not sure why Ken is aware of sex while Barbie is not. Maybe Ken is allosexual, bisexual, and intersex (he does tell someone in the real world he has “all the genitals” and “beaches off” with the other Ken), while Barbie is asexual. Does sex exist in Barbie Land? It’s left vague despite the Kens at least having romantic feelings. Do any of the Barbies have romantic feelings? It’s not shown. They seem to have more little-girl-type interests and attitudes. So why then do the Kens seem to be sexually mature…?

I wasn’t the biggest fan of the flip plotline (Barbie Land being taken over by patriarchy) when I saw this film in the theater. It felt like it was drawing a false equivalence between matriarchy and patriarchy and saying each is just as damaging when the Kens weren’t as oppressed under Barbie rule as the Barbies were under Kendom. Neither had identity or power when they were in a lower position, but the Kens were just accessories where the Barbies were literally brainwashed servants. The Kens just had to sit there and look pretty, the Barbies had to do actual labor.

I also tend to be a little skeptical in general of the idea that hypothetical matriarchy would be just as bad as real patriarchy. Obviously egalitarianism is the ideal, but I can’t help but feel that matriarchy would be better than patriarchy. If I were a man in matriarchy… I would be frustrated at the lack of power, but I wouldn’t be as afraid as I would be as a woman in a highly patriarchal society. Very patriarchal societies tend to be violent towards women and I feel like that’s a lot worse than being disenfranchised as a man in a matriarchy.

I can think of matriarchal dystopias, but I haven’t read any matriarchal utopias. There’s a list on Bustle that has: The Herland Trilogy by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, A Door Into Ocean by Joan Slonczewski, Sultana’s Dream by Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, and The Wanderground by Sally Miller Gearhart and those looked interesting.

The only way I could imagine matriarchies being just as violent towards men as patriarchies are towards women is if women got ahold of a technology that could negate or reverse sexual dimorphism. For example, robots that would follow men around and zap them with a laser if they didn’t do their chores or if they hurt a woman. Without some element of gender-based violence, I don’t buy the idea that matriarchies are equally as bad as patriarchies.

I will admit Barbie Land was unfair to Kens, they didn’t have as much power or identity and President Barbie doesn’t even let the Kens have one Supreme Court justice at the end. I was also a little surprised with how quickly Ken gave up his power at the end, saying the thing he liked most about patriarchy was the horses. At the end, Barbie Land stays matriarchal and reality stays patriarchal, so there are no broad societal changes.

In the movie, subjugation is aligned with having fewer responsibilities as well as less pressure to perform and to act as an authority. Ken feels more relaxed in matriarchy, the Barbies feel more relaxed in patriarchy. There’s an appeal to not being in power and not having to think or carry the burdens of choice and agency. That is a privileged perspective since it doesn’t hold true unless you have someone else taking care of you. I think it’s good that the filmmakers chose to show the appeal of being a subject under patriarchy/matriarchy. It’s hard to resist something without being aware of its appeals.

I also wonder why the Barbies had to use their feminine wiles to beat the Kens instead of literally fighting them. I don’t think physical strength matters when playing with dolls. Why is Allan able to beat up five Kens? It’s funny, but it doesn’t really make sense. I guess narratively it’s not as interesting to have the Barbies assemble an army and wage war against the Kens, but it would be fun to watch the Barbies upend gender norms and go all G.I. Joe on the Kens’ asses (though perhaps that kind of thing would be more at home in Robot Chicken).

It’s interesting that the Barbies are able to rule Barbie Land without violence or even the threat of violence. I think that’s actually probably the most revolutionary utopian aspect of Barbie Land. The vote to put Barbies back in charge goes through Congress and the Kens are able to accept it without a fight. It’s unrealistic, but I think it makes sense for a movie about toys to play out scenarios that wouldn’t happen in the real world.

Generally, I think the Barbie movie is both a good movie and a feminist movie. I love the sets and costumes and some of the songs and jokes. I like the filmmakers’ take on Barbie as an object yearning to become a subject, activated by a real woman’s yearning to see herself and her everyday worries about getting older represented. Weird Barbie is hilarious and I really liked Allan’s quiet, non-toxic strength. Barbie is a feminist movie, but it acknowledges some of the continuing struggles of feminism, like the fight against sexual harassment and the temptation to forfeit power out of laziness or fatigue.

It does miss out on any heavy-hitting criticisms of Barbie like Barbie’s effect on girls’ body image and how Barbie’s sexualized appearance can be seen as objectifying to women, but it’s hard for the Barbie movie to criticize Barbie too much because Mattel is sponsoring it.

I wonder what people are going to think of the Barbie movie in 20 years. Will it be a relic of 2020s feminism or will it still be loved by audiences? Only time will tell…

I will say, it’s definitely a complicated movie. I thought this was going to be a quick little breezy review but here I am on page 7. Oops.