EDITED because sometimes I make stupid mistakes (in this case about queer rep) and they need to be rectified.

Is there a degree of cognitive dissonance when a movie is made for, and will make a crapton of money for, a mega company that only makes money by encouraging people to buy things that they really don’t need and that has arguably profited from and encouraged misogyny and the patriarchy, and then that movie directly challenges capitalism and (especially) patriarchy and misogyny?

Think I answered my own question.

So yes, I saw the Barbie movie, and I loved it.

I was vaguely interested in the idea of this movie, and then I saw the trailer and, in particular, Kate McKinnon’s chaotic energy and that moment with the high-heel vs the Birkenstock, and I knew that this movie was going to be excellent and that I would love it. I did not expect to see it at the cinema, and not on opening night, but some friends will make you do that.

Given the sort of movies I tend to watch, I don’t honestly remember ever being in a theatre that was overwhelmingly female. And that was pretty amazing, too.

In no way a comprehensive review, but does include some spoilers:

Kate McKinnon was indeed excellent. So was Margot Robbie. You may already have seen some of the press that Ryan Gosling is doing; he really threw himself into Ken in a startling way. Of the other Kens, Kingsley Ben-Adir was my favourite, because he’s Kingsley Ben-Adir; Simu Liu was also, of course, glorious. I enjoyed the diversity of Barbies, reflecting the more recent realities of Barbie-the-doll, too; President Barbie might have been my favourite.

There is a good amount of Barbie-related humour, of course. The different versions of Barbie, the discontinued lines (omg I don’t remember Midge); the thing about Barbie suddenly having flat feet is in the trailer… this was made by people who know and love Barbies.

I don’t know if I missed it in the hype (I’ve been avoiding the hype), but Helen Mirren? As the narrator? Genius. Also the fact that the narration is just a bit meta – not too meta, but just enough. My friend suggested there should be a cut with Mirren just narrating and snarking the whole way through; I would pay more money to see that.

The story itself: it’s a coming of age, in many ways. Naive Barbie learns difficult truths about The Real World and makes friends along the way. It could have been done in such a terribly cheesy way. Instead, I think it embraced a level of earnestness that skirted the cheesy/not cheesy line, and then added some gleeful silliness that was honestly just fun. (The Kens’ musical number was… something else.) It somehow manages to do genuine ‘the world is broken in so many ways’ combined with ‘and yet there is love and music and beauty’. Mileages may vary but I was left feeling ok about the balance. It never tries to say that the latter outweighs or somehow flattens the former; in fact, anger at the brokenness is key to the story itself.

Do I know that this is a corporate mechanism to make money and sell toys? Of course it is. Does it manage to also make a statement about women, being a woman, being a mother, being a man, and navigating those identities? Absolutely it does. Did it have queer representation? Not that I noticed yeh so “not that I noticed” is indeed the point here. By “queer” I was thinking “in or desiring a same-sex relationship.” This is of course far too exclusive for the term ‘queer’. Given the running joke about the lack of genitals, the Barbies and Kens ‘are canonically asexual’; at least one is aromantic; therefore there’s a whole bunch of queer characters, actually, and the idea that I would erase that is horrifying and I’m really embarrassed. Much thanks to Liz for pointing this out, and apologies for doing this.

; nor trans (I wouldn’t be surprised if including either of those would have made the movie over its PG rating, because America). Did I entirely love the very last scene? I was left a little bewildered, honestly, and I’m still not sure what to make of it.

Am I likely to re-watch Barbie? Oh yes.