Barbie Movie out of the Box

Sometimes I feel compelled to write a review of a film even if it's not a film festival film that I have been accredited to review.

This film was a ride from beginning to the end.  Talk about getting Barbie outside of the Box.  This film is not what you think it would be.  It's a spectacle as you would imagine,  think La La Land and Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory mixed with Hidden Figures and Erin Brocovitch.  

This is the case with the new BARBIE movie Directed by Greta Gerwig.  

There are dance sequences, loads of crazy sets, crazy fashion and oh so much diversity.

Starring Margo Robbie as stereotypical Barbie and Ryan Gosling as Ken.  After seeing them you can't really imagine anyone else performing those roles.  Margo is the perfect mix of vulnerability, intelligence and fun.   Ryan Gosling is clueless, over the top and extra.

The cast is rounded out with Simu Liu the other rival Ken to Ryan Gosling and the 3rd Canadian in the film is Michael Cera who is sensitive and neglected Allan.  His character was so funny.

The casting of this film was perfection with the following cast members and cameos with:

• Kate MacKinnon as Weird Barbie who tells Barbie to go to the real world.
• John Cena pops up in a spectacular ensemble as Ken.
• Dua Lipa pops up every now and then but I won't say as what.
• America Ferrera is the Mom who tries to save Barbie.
• Will Farrell is the CEO of Mattel.  As you can imagine his usual hilarious self.
• Rhea Perlman is the inventor of Barbie
• Helen Mirren isn't even seen and she adds so much to the film.

This film is spectacular, hilarious and thought provoking.

The sets were mostly real and it really looks like a Barbie world.

The thing I enjoyed the most was the dialogue.  Fast and smart with lines you will take away with you for a while.

America Ferrera's speech on what it's like to be a woman is epic and should be shown to every teen girl.

You can certainly tell that Greta Gerwig had something to say that was decades in the making and she really put everything into this film.   

It's most definitely a female director perspective and I don't think anyone else would have made it the same way.

I went with a group of friends and one Ken who didn't like how Ken was the bad guy in the film.

It takes a searing look at patriarchy and who male privilege has ruled the world.

The screening I went to was like nothing I have ever seen before.  There was pink everywhere and so many people wearing shoes they could barely walk in.   My friends and I all wore some pink and I wish we had a shot of all of us.  We weren't over the top but a nod to Barbie.   Someone asked to take a photo with us after the movie.  We should have asked them to take one for us... didn't think of it at the time.

We did take photos in the Box installation at the theatre.  There was a long lineup of people waiting to do selfies.  We split up into 2's to get our pics in so mine was with my friend Lisa.

This was the most popular Marketing I have ever seen at a theatre.   People came to be seen and experience this movie.

The fact that Barbie is over 60 years old now shows how many generations connected to Barbie.  Even if you never had a Barbie you know all about the legendary doll.

I haven't had that much fun at a movie in a very long time if ever.  I even had to sit by myself because I waited too long to get tickets and it was almost sold out by the time I did a week before.   The people on either side of me were also really enjoying it.

I really hope Greta Gerwig gets a bunch of Academy Award Nominations because this film was truly original, entertaining and filled with so many things to think about.

I want to see more films like this and less guns, and car chases and murders.   

I like to go to the movies to have fun and escape the stress of life.  This is the kind of film that suspends all other thoughts of anything but what's happening on the screen.

I don't do ratings but I would give it 9 Barbies.

 Watching the film is like going to an amusement park.  What a ride.

Why the Writers and Actors strike is important for everyone.

The Writers Guild of America (WGA) and Screen Actors Guild (SAG) have now joined the picket lines forming an Alliance against the people that hold their life's work in their hands and this is history making in progress.

Why you should care about this strike?

1. This kind of strike hasn't happened in 60 years.

2. This is a crossroad in time to change that might change the future of the entertainment industry and have a ripple effect on other industries.

3.  The majority of writers and actors do not make a proper living wage because they are essentially gig workers.  Not all of them are million dollar plus talent.  That is a small percent.

4. This could affect change in other industries besides the entertainment industry.

5.  Human rights and sustainability.

I have a Union permittee for Makeup although I do not work in film for my living I am trying to finish a documentary independently.  Although this doesn't stop me from making films it will still affect me in ways that don't connect to the actor/writer strike.   I am a part of a Union but in the Ontario Public Service so I know how important it is for Unions to fight for the rights of the workers.

In this case the fight is about more than just money, benefits or working hours.  It's about the right to make a living with your talents and likeness.  It's about the studios trying to save money by being able to use someone's likeness over and over without having to pay the actor and a crew to show up on location.  Sounds great for a studio but remember the ripple effect if an actor is "cloned" in a film or series.   There won't be the following jobs or industries that also make a living from film/tv productions.  

Here are some of them.

1. Camera crew
2. Lighting crew
3. Sound Crew
4. Makeup Artist
5. Hair stylists
6. Catering
7. Prop houses 
8. Local businesses for florals, food, clothing, greens, rentals
9. Post production
10. Administrative staff
11. Accountants 
12. Lawyers
13. Musicians

you get the picture... I could go on.

AI is not perfect and basically pulls from already recorded knowledge and is only as good as the information that it is given or the person operating it.  It can't make up original ideas and content would be affected.

How would you like it if you posted your image to social media and a studio lifted that image and put it into a film as a character and made a slight change and you were not notified or compensated.  That's what could happen to you and the actors.

In the writers case they will just put in some details and let Chat GPT or whatever create a script that might be a copy of something else and could be boring and at the least not very original.

This strike is important to get right because it's the future of the writers, actors and the industry as a whole.  Currently with the strike on production has come to a halt so all the people working on productions can't work.  Industries that supply the productions aren't making money.  Theatres and streaming and networks aren't going to get new content.

It will also affect me in September when the Actors usually come to the Toronto International Film Festival.   My job is to escort the films Entourage around the building at the festival.  No promotion allowed means no actors that will be there and no publicists, photographers, videographers, film festival staff and most likely a reduction of ticket sales for TIFF.   Although Tiff is International it's the big celebrities that attract patrons from all over the world to buy tickets to the festival.   They will still be able to have a festival because it's only SAG/AFTRA but it will be most likely reduced similar to the pandemic days of the festival.   My team did not do the lockdown years of the festival.

So that's just the tip of the iceberg.  Yes you won't have anything to watch and lots of people won't make money.   So what?  Well what is your job?  Your industry could be affected by the ripple effect of the economy or what's really important is the replacement of your jobs because the Corporations choose AI over hiring human beings.  

Look at the war in Ukraine which is being fought with sophisticated weapons which are AI driven.  Not that we want people to go back to the battlefields but that's where a lot of this started.

The automotive industry uses more and more AI each year.   I am not saying technology is bad as a whole but there are consequences to the use.  Think of what happens when the power goes out?  What about the time when Rogers Communications whole network went out for a day.  What happens when an autonomous Uber vehicle fails.

Technology fails just as much as human error.  How many times has your phone or computer failed?  

Yes technology can be used in dangerous situations or remote areas or to reduce repetitive injuries but in the wrong hands it can also have a huge negative affect.

I have been watching a lot of news stories and listening to podcasts and watching documentaries and when the people that were the ones to create some of these technologies start waving a cautionary flag you have to stop and take notice and think about future decisions before they are irreversible.

Some films to check out:

1. IRobot
2. Minority Report
3. Artifact Girl
4. Megan
5. Her
6. Ex Machina
7. AI Artificial Intelligence
8. The Social Dilemma
9. Unknown Killer Robots
10. Code Bias
11. Black Mirror
12. Replicas

I had a little fun with the image to show how the image can be created and just sub in anything.  How will you know if anything is real?  I just used emojis for fun but this could happen with anyone's likeness and made to say or do anything.

Does this not make you think about freedoms, privacy, human rights, power, going too far?