According to The Hollywood Reporter, the PG-13 movie’s plot is teased as: “To live in Barbie Land is to be a perfect being in a perfect place. Unless you have a full-on existential crisis. Or you’re a Ken.”
And director Greta Gerwig told People magazine in an interview about the film: “We invent things like dolls to explain to ourselves what it means to be human… Part of me wondered if there was a way that we could allow the doll to also have that humanity.
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the Queen of Plastic was given something real?”
Rated PG-13 with “suggestive references and brief language”, here are some key things you might like to consider as a parent before making pinker than pink plans for the weekend.
America Ferrera, Margot Robbie, Alexandra Shipp, and Ariana Greenblatt in Barbie. Photo / Warner Bros.
As seen in a trailer for the film, Barbie, played by Margot Robbie, is enthusiastically dancing with her friends when all of a sudden she asks: “Do you guys ever think about dying?”
It’s a moment exemplary of what film critics have described the film as: “It’s heady and existential and sometimes uses big words, but smart kids will be eager to lean forward and meet the movie on those terms,” a source told People magazine.
Meanwhile, Danny Brogan, the executive editor of Common Sense Media, an organisation that screens and rates content for kids, told Yahoo!, “I think Gerwig has included all this maturer content knowing that a large portion of the audience will be millennials and members of Generation Z — people who grew up with Barbie during the ‘80s, ‘90s and ‘00s — looking for that nostalgia but also to be entertained. They’re no longer that 8-year-old who took Barbie everywhere with them.”
Kate McKinnon as 'Weird Barbie' in Barbie. Photo / Warner Bros.
The candy-sweet looking film does feature some suggestive language that may not sit right with parents of young kids. However, it may also go well over their heads.
In one scene featured in a trailer, Ryan Gosling’s Ken tells another Ken doll: “I would beach you off,” to which the Ken doll responds, “I’ll beach off with you any day.” It’s an example of several instances where the use of language may or may not be picked up by a younger audience.
Comments made by “Weird Barbie”, played by Kate McKinnon, may also be considered sexually suggestive.
One such line: “I’d like to see what smooth blob he’s packing in those shorts,” may be deemed inappropriate for some.
Throughout the film, offensive language is used including motherf***** which is bleeped out to comedic effect.
Ready to discuss feminism?
Margot Robbie as Barbie. Photo / Warner Bros.
Some parents will be eager to broach issues around feminism and the patriarchy and feel their child is at the right age to have a discussions about this. In those cases, the movie, according to a People magazine source, “[is] about how women are treated and viewed in the world — to a sometimes surprising degree.”
As the film sees Barbie and Ken leave the idylls of Barbie Land and enter the real world, scenes depict Ken becoming radicalised by a notion of American patriarchy while Barbie finds herself being sexualised and demeaned, at one point she’s slapped on the butt by a man - to which she responds by punching him in the face.
There’s violence - in a cartoonish way
Ryan Gosling, Kingsley Ben-Adir, and Ncuti Gatwa as Ken in Barbie. Photo / Warner Bros.
Inflatable pool toys become flimsy “weapons” and there’s a spot of aggressive dancing but while a PG-13 rating can often point to violence in a film, this is not the case for Barbie.
Some scenes feature a sense of peril but not to the extent that would likely incite fear, even in a youngster.
All in all, the trailers available online do give an indication of what’s in store for parents who may be on the fence about taking kids along. But as critics and their reviews attest, it’s worth a watch for adults, either way.
