The famous doll becomes the heroine of a live-action film for the first time, which is released in theaters on Wednesday. In more than 60 years of existence, the character has had to evolve with the times.
She was one of the first women to be an astronaut and to stand as a candidate for a presidential election, to become a surgeon… A pioneer in many fields, the Barbie doll nevertheless had to wait more than 60 years to debut in the cinema in a live-action film. The feature film Barbiedirected by Greta Gerwig, with Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling in the role of Ken, will be released on Wednesday July 19 in French cinemas.
At the sight of the trailer, which sends Barbie rubbing shoulders with the real world, and the CVs of the director and the actress, also a producer, this feature film promises something other than a candy pink comedy recounting the adventures of a doll and her perfect companion. In 2023, after the #MeToo movement shook society and the film industry, Barbie, the toy and the film, couldn’t be content with being a watered down, superficial thing.
What it is not, however, when it leaves. In March 1959, Elliot and Ruth Handler, respectively the founder and director and the vice-president in charge of marketing of the Mattel brand, took part in the toy fair in New York. She comes to present a doll that she named Barbie in homage to their daughter Barbara. She projects an emancipatory object for young girls.
“The idea I had of Barbie was that through the doll, the little girl could become whoever she wanted. Barbie has always embodied a woman who has a choice.”
Ruth Handler, creator of Barbiein a press release
“Creating an ‘adult’ doll is a profoundly feminist gesture, whether conscious of it or not.confirm Sandrine Galand, literature professor in Montreal and author of the essay pop feminism (ed. of the Remue-household). Before, little girls were encouraged from early childhood to take care of their doll. The game reproduced the framework for which mothers were intended. For the very first time, young girls were offered a game that allowed them to project themselves into a different future.” Unmarried, Ken being only a companion created two years after her, childless, she was active and free. An image far from that of the pin-up, which will soon stick to her skin.
More than a physical
With her idealized perfect body, her generous breasts, her long blond hair, her white skin, her high heels, the doll cleaves because she conveys “sexist stereotypes”assures Sabrina Bouarour, doctor of cinematographic studies and specialist in gender representations. “As a toy representing an adult woman, she also has the physical attributes that were, and still are, sexualized and standardized by society.“abounds Karine Haucolas, who supports the digital promotion of brands in the entertainment industry. “IIt would be wrong to think that there is a desire to perpetuate clichés or a restrictive vision of femininity. Ruth Handler wants to create a beautiful toy, which allows dreams and which responds to the codes of the time which is hers”believes Sandrine Galand.
This pin-up physique, maligned, is however “bold” for the time, observes Karine Haucolas. Autonomous, object of male desire, “the pin-up asserts herself as an individual free of her body and of what she wants to show, she gives herself the right to an assumed sexuality and she is an actor in it”, explains the communicator. Aware, however, that mentalities are changing and so as not to leave the doll prisoner of its image, Mattel has diversified it. “It represented above all a huge production cost before being obvious to society”shade Karine Haucolas.
Barbie becomes black, Asian, gains in curves, wears the hijab. “Today, Barbie embodies different forms of femininity, with distinct bodies based on ethnicity, with different skin colors and hair”, observes Sabrina Bouarour. Children can play with albino, disabled, vitiligo dolls. In total, there are 175 different types of Barbie.
“Initially, this toy offered a new vision of women to little girls, it was a precursor in the desire to shake up the codes that society wants to impose on women.”
Karine Haucolas, expert in digital communicationat franceinfo
The doll is no longer just a fantasy of a woman with a unique and stereotyped body. The feature film arrives after all this process of evolution. In a Hollywood always looking for a new franchise to adapt. But also, in a “pop culture” and a seventh art which is barely recovering from the aftershocks of the #MeToo earthquake.
The show at the service of the cause
A 100 million dollar film, produced by a big studio (Warner Bros) on an icon of the consumer society… On paper, Barbie does not tick all the boxes of the ode to women. “A pop object necessarily participates in a capitalist logic. It was born at the heart of cultural industries that make their money from stereotypes, particularly with regard to gender. It is above all a question of pleasing in order to sell. All of this is fundamentally opposed to feminist values and issues., theorizes Sandrine Galand. But these two contrary currents will meet during the 2010s.
Feminist social mobilizations are taking over social networks, culminating in the #MeToo movement, and the term “feminist” appears more regularly in the media and products of the entertainment industry. Each new film, each new series with strong female characters is followed by the famous adjective. “It seems to be become a hashtag of our time”, notes the professor. If celebrated in the media, this feminism is “disqualified in certain spheres, intellectual and militant, because he capitulates in front of the universe of the spectacle”she notes.
“Barbie, or rather the feminist dimension that we concede to her today, is part of this ‘pop feminism’, thought in connection with her performance.”
Sandrine Galand, author of “Pop Feminism”at franceinfo
Aware of the challenges of adaptation, Margot Robbie had made a point of displaying her intentions during an interview with The Hollywood Reporter : “With this franchise, the name itself, people immediately have a preconceived idea: ‘Oh, Margot (Robbie) is going to play Barbie, I can see what it’s going to be like.’ But our goal is something else: ‘Whatever you imagined, we’re going to give you something totally different.'” This desire to “hustle” has never ceased to inhabit the producer. In the Timeshe says that during the first meeting with Ynon Kreiz, the CEO of Mattel, she assured him that the heritage of the brand would be honored, “but that it was also necessary to address certain less consensual subjects. Because if we don’t, others will. And it’s better to be part of that conversation.”
Revenge of a Blonde
Revealed at Martin Scorsese, for his role in The wolf of Wall StreetMargot Robbie has since moved between “badass” female roles (Harley Quinn in Suicide Squadskater Tonya Harding in Me Tonyaor recently in babylon) and produces, via his company LuckyChap, committed films such as Promising Young Woman. Imagining her as Barbie is not very difficult, but behind the camera, the presence of Greta Gerwig may surprise. Figure of independent cinema, director of lady bird and Daughters of Doctor Marchthe American brings serious feminist support to the project.
“Greta Gerwig has already taken up the question of the representation of the feminine, she used a popular novel from the 19th century to ask very current questions about the feminine condition.”
Sabrina Bouarour, Doctor of Film Studiesat franceinfo
The director also wrote the film with her companion, filmmaker Noah Baumbach. A duo renowned for the accuracy and intelligence of their gaze, who will have to spare the nostalgia of these children who have become adults who will travel to theaters while providing them with a critical eye in the face of a gratuitously exacerbated femininity. “There wouldn’t have been a better director than Greta Gerwig. She already has the automatisms to challenge society. She is aware of what a film like this can represent in our time”summarizes Karine Haucolas.
All while assuming a self-mockery, a weapon that allows him “a form of irreverence”assures Sandrine Galand. “The second degree, it sticks to Barbie today. It’s entertainment, it doesn’t take itself seriously. The Barbie universe allows us to be in humor and in the imagination”, supports Karine Haucolas. The nods to high heels, the reference to 2001, A Space Odyssey have also hit the bull’s eye.
“By playing with her image, Barbie can chart a new horizon for representations of the female body in pop culture.”
Sandrine Galand, author of “Pop Feminism”at franceinfo
Little girls, who have grown Barbie in their hands, are now aware of the symbolism of the doll. They will be able to look at her with hindsight and also thank her. “My love of pop culture led me to feminism rather than away from it. Si write, today, it is thanks to the Barbies, with which I played until the age of 13, concludes Sandrine Galand, I sat in my room, my Barbies on my knees, and I wrote them lives in silence in my head, nothing in this game weakened me.