[EXPRESSO] Barbie (2023) | Life In Plastic

For once i’m glad here in Italy we don’t get movie releases as the US do, because Oppenheimer is releasing in late August here, so i can bury that stupid “Barbenheimer” shit.

So, the Barbie movie, by renowed director Greta Gerwig, it’s definitely something i’d been looking forward since announcement, wondering what the fuck the plot of a live-action Barbie movie could be, this isn’t aimed at children like the dozens of animated Barbie movies we’ve seen over the years, at all.

The basic gist is similar to Enchanted, as we’re introduced to Barbieland, a world where Barbies live perfect days, party and have fun in perpetuity… until the “Stereotype Barbie” (Margot Robbie) has an existential crisis, seek help from the wise old “Weird Barbie” that tells her she has to go to the real world and reconnect with the girl that played with her in order to fix the situation. Problem is, Mattel itself learns that “Barbie has breached contaiment”, and one of the Kens (Ryan Gosling) sneaks away into the real world too…

It’s a feminist comedy that use the brand to tackle the obvious themes you’d think, in modern ouvert (and very meta) fashion as expected and… well, neeeded, because at this point we know audiences can be quite “thick”, but it’s as brazen as it’s funny and caring in poking fun, showing a profound love of cinema in doing so, with some really nice musical segments and amazing sets.

It’s not perfect, for example the main plot is basically resolved 40 minutes in and then it kinda feels like they had to follow a “b-plot” for the sake of the runtime, the feminism itself it’s slightly superficial (not shallow, but not deep either), but even with its flaws, it’s a really sincere, entertaining and witty film.

Pinocchi-O-Rama #3: Geppetto (2000)

Yes, we’re doing a Disney Pinocchio movie, but not the ones you might think of, since we’re travelling back to the dawn of the millennium for the kind of Pinocchio film that’s actually more common than you’d think: the musical. One of them, anyway, we’re doing some of the more intriguing ones later this year, today we spotlight a fairly forgotten made-for-tv musical starring Drew Carey and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, simply called “Geppetto” and released in 2000.

The idea – as exemplified by the title itself – is a nice variation on terms of how to retell the story of Pinocchio, because one could reasonably argue how odd that the narrative prioritizes following a character who’s personality basically was “pre-loaded” since “birth”, while leaving mostly in the background the only character that has past and would feasibly benefit from an arc.

At least, that’s what a superficial analysis might lead one to believe, but there is some truth to it regardless, because Geppetto is important to the narrative, and after all he’s the one who wanted so badly to be a father, albeit not in the way the story does.

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12 Days Of Dino Dicember #4: Attack Of The Super Monsters (1982)

It really IS Christmas time, because today we’re doing a movie that’s both dinosaurs and vintage tokusatsu cheesiness from the 80s. How can you go wrong? You simply can’t.

Add drill spaceship to the mix and you really can’t go wrong.

Though it’s worth pointing out this is actually an edited down TV series (i suppose it’s just the first 4 episodes of the series mashed together, as it was a common practice at the time), Dinosaur War Aizenborg, itself quite the interesting piece of media, as it’s an hybrid anime and live action show, with sentai style rubber suit and stop motion puppets action for the dinosaurs and giant monsters, but animation for the humans and most regular animals, played over live-action miniature sets.

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