The Intellectual Thru-Line Between Barbie and Oppenheimer
“Isn’t it a little sad how important we need to feel?”
In general, I enjoyed the Barbie movie more than Oppenheimer. For posterity let me give a little background. In the summer of 2023 two big popcorn movies hit theaters and someone on the internet decided it would be fun to assert you should see them in the same day. At least this is how I took the meme Barbenheimer — for as an active cinephile I’ve often had two film days and it immediately struck me these would be different enough films they might be amusing to see back to back. I got my girlfriend to help me make a chart on how we could pay for the first movie then sneak into the second. The times didn’t line up perfectly, so after realizing I’m an adult and don’t really want to spend 20 minutes sitting in a bathroom stall just to avoid having to pay for another movie, we decided to have lunch inbetween.
Said lunch never happened. The main reason being I had decided to see Oppenheimer first. You have the main course and desert after, this was my logic. But Oppenheimer was a marathon to sit through. At nearly 3 hours, and on a fairly decent dose of marijuana edibles, it does not put you in the mood to watch another film. To point out criticisms of a film like Oppenheimer feels pointless and arbitrary — but if I was going to speak from my own background of knowledge: I felt like Oppenheimer spent too much time on the political stuff. There’s a line towards the end where Einstein advises Oppenheimer about the reality of how the political world would eventually treat him and to just let it go. I found it confusing why Oppenheimer doesn’t take this advice, or, why we the audience can still feel so invested in Oppenheimer’s having Security Clearance with the US government. As far as I’m aware; most physicists can do physics without a security clearance. It probably would’ve been helpful for Oppenheimer to accept his rejection from the establishment. I was mildly impressed and surprised by the amount of emotional response I heard from other people in the theater. Since the movie doesn’t really shy away from painting Oppenheimer as a figure tortured by the true belief he may have destroyed the world. How can someone who destroyed the world be a good guy? How can you root for total destruction?
With the retrospective we have today I think it’s fairly safe to say that the invention of the Atomic Bomb probably has prevented more large scale war and if the bomb can have been invented it will always do so, it was only a matter of time. I think there’s also an argument to be made that the US coming to it first, considering the ideals and time period, was probably not the worst version on the infinite timeline of how the bomb was first discovered. There’s definitely better versions — on this infinite timeline — but to the extent that the scientists involved did it for the “right” reasons I think it’s OK. One of my favorite characters is Benny Safdie’s, the actorial part of the directorial duo who put out one of my favorite third act movies I’ve ever seen, Good Time (I like how the third act truly takes an unexpected turn), Safdie’s character in Oppenheimer is deeply involved with the moral question of; “How big does this bomb need to be before it is so scary it can end all wars.”
Oppenheimer, for his part, is just making sure the actual project sees a result. The first two/thirds of the movie might be subtitled; waiting for the bomb. The audience already knows a nuclear explosion is imminent we just don’t know when it will come or how it will be portrayed. I think the film Oppenheimer does a good job with the explosion. It is large but the focus tends more towards the characters and their own witness. I have no idea how Nolan managed to mimic a nuclear shockwave blowing past the actors. Some large turbines of a kind? I’ll have to wait for the DVD.
The part which worked best for me about Oppenheimer, however, was the interiority. Basically, the way it begins and ends (but mostly the end). I really felt, walking out of the theater, the complexity of mythology. How if one was to imagine themselves as a demon who brought about the end of the world, how, well, complex that would feel. There was also the other bit, the sadness.
“Isn’t it a little sad that we need to feel so important — we might destroy ourselves?”
3 Weeks and another decent dose of edibles later I was on the verge of tears in the Barbie movie. Sad, again, for our needs in reality. How one should look, this is the frontpiece, the display of Barbie. I have many compliments for the film, not least of which is that it does a high wire act with its gender material (the major compliment being how funny Barbie is). Too much gender politics would have made the tone cloying, but Barbie keeps a light touch. Actually, by the end of the film I was wondering if Ken’s role didn’t steal most of the focus. Ken has a much more well defined character arc than Barbie — even where the filmmakers, at the end of the script, had to explore Barbie’s ending in very ‘meta’ fashion. Asking the question outloud what her ending should be. Ken gets the big song. In any case it’s not important to hit that point hard I just thought it was interesting what for all exterior appearances of feminism those who would get the most out of the movie are probably men.
The Barbie’s are never questioning their possibilities. During the third act they are brainwashed by the patriarchy idea Ken brings in from the real world but once they are snapped out of it they return easily to competent and clearheaded. (What snaps them out of this trance is a good monologue considering the hypocrisies placed upon them by the world). A woman walking out of the Barbie movie, like my girlfriend did, feels like they have not gotten any new information. I, on the other hand, had to think about how common of an occurrence it must be in every woman’s life where she has to sit patiently pretending to be enthralled at a man playing the guitar at her. This guitar playing is the climax of Barbie.
Feeling diminished and needing to compensate for it is one of the staples of tragedy. And using toys, the ultimate tool in childhood fantasy exploration, is a great medium for exposing the overcompensation which begets our power fantasies. Revenge and the like. Ken’s character might as well be called an InCel (involuntary celibate) for his need to be seen and resulting overcompensation. Barbie has some great and genuine personal touches (including using a BBC clip from Pride and Prejudice) but using this Matchbox 20 song felt like very much an old bone to pick that the writers Gerwig or Baumbach have been holding onto for years — this song which exposes some of the weird, fundamental, bullshit that comprises a feeling of being out of control and over-correcting.
“I want to push you around. Well I will, well I will … I want to take you for granted.”
Don’t we all, in a way, desire to take the people in our life for granted? This could be considered the human condition in a nutshell, or even, in Capitalism terms, the expectation we place on the working class. It also includes Barbie’s original relationship to Ken. Of course she wouldn’t be convicted of manipulating his feelings, he’s already doing plenty of that to himself; but Barbie is absolutely taking Ken for granted. In the most literal way — she’s taking everything in her life for granted. That her life is self evident and ever continuing … until it isn’t. This is how Barbie begins her hero’s journey and now I can finally begin to compliment how well written the movie is.
And, rather unfortunately to continue to write about the positive male influence on the Barbie story, what really got me in the door was seeing Noah Baumbach* was co-writer. It’s just very rare to see an independent filmmaker tackle a task like making a film about Barbie. It has been amusing to me to see executive's eyes light up at the idea of making more movies like Barbie (which has now made a BILLION dollars worldwide) but not have the presence of mind to realize the entire background which made the script possible. The script is a well oiled machine, hitting every beat that needs to be hit while still feeling quirky and unique. I imagine that Gerwig and Baumbach are actually feeling a little bit tortured right now because it is strange to make something with the intention that everyone should like it. They accepted a long time ago that to make true art meant pushing a few buttons. But Barbie is truly remarkable, one might even say a miracle of pushing buttons in just the right order.
Admittedly using dolls as your heroes is a bit of a cheat. Even in Barbie’s most profound moments it has recourse to a joke. The movie is filled with character’s sense of their own self importance and yet as the audience we are let off the hook from taking them seriously (after all, kind of like the actor’s themselves, they don’t have to spend every waking moment in reality). The biggest response I heard in the theater from the kids sitting around me was when Ryan Gosling’s Ken finishes his character arc and comes back on screen, without any lines, wearing a sweatshirt brandishing the phrase Kenough. We were happy he found peace within himself.
But I still couldn’t help walking out of the theater with a little sadness in my heart. Reminded by how often and to what depths of despair we need to take ourselves seriously. Any popcorn movie which can hide deep thoughts like that in the background accomplishes what I’m looking for in a film. Barbie’s big accomplishment is managing to satirize without needing to be outright satire. I wish there had been something similar in Oppenheimer; but at their core they have a similar theme. Everyone needs to be somebody — myself included — yet I do find small catharsis in seeing this portrayed both with humor and a dash of the pathetic (Barbie) and overly self serious (Oppenheimer).
*If you don’t know Baumbach’s work and refuse to give him a google I’ll give one pertinent example of Baumbach’s indie roots. The Squid and the Whale. A young man tries to impress and live up to the intellectual example of his father who is a professor of experimental literature. The definition of an indie movie if you’ve ever heard one.
