As the box office was taken by storm this summer with two of the most highly anticipated releases of the year – Barbie and Oppenheimer – the same question lingered in seemingly everyone’s mind – Barbie? Oppenheimer? or Both?
On one hand, you have Oppenheimer – Christopher Nolan’s incredible biopic exploring the destructive and scientifically incredible work of J. Oppenheimer in the creation of the atomic bomb. Nolan’s cinematic masterpiece explored the colourful world of Oppenheimer at the time, contrasting the harsh, objective gaze upon which Oppenheimer was viewed. The bigatures (miniature scale models) used in the filming of the atomic bomb scene. The struggles of having to portray the most ‘ambitious and paradoxical character yet’ for Christopher Nolan (however having Cillian Murphy in the title role must have helped). Oppenheimer provided a shocking and horrific reminder of humanity’s power to destroy itself. The 3 hours 9 second long cinematic masterpiece provided a mind-altering narrative on the scientific horrors of our past and our ability for self-annihilation all combined with the piercing eyes of Cillian Murphy staring into the audience. The audience’s astounded silence only punctuated by the distant sounds of Dua Lipa’s ‘Dance the Night’ from the next-door screening of Barbie. The supposedly light, happy world of Barbieland was tantalisingly close for those who didn’t find the narrative on world destruction by scientific development quite to their taste.
So, after the grim portrayal of nuclear destruction the faint tune of ‘so fantastic made of plastic’ seemed to be a source of light relief to restore your faith in humanity. But it wasn’t really.
When you think of Barbie you think of the conventional plastic toys, Barbie’s dream house and pink and the film lived up to that – cinematically, it was what you would expect and it delivers it well. More than that the cast was littered with stars – other than the obvious Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling as Barbie and Ken respectively, you had John Cena and Dua Lipa as Merpeople(!?) The soundtrack was also littered with some of the biggest names of the modern music industry. Oppenheimer too had an incredible cast – Cillian Murphy, Florence Pugh and Robert Downey Jr to say the least. It was clear from the off that both were set to be incredible and the cast lived up to the expectation.
Oppenheimer was really what it said on the tin – a biopic of the life of J. Oppenheimer. However, Barbie wasn’t exactly what you would expect – rather than being an extremely light-hearted, feel-good movie – it left some with a slightly soured taste in their mouth and it wasn’t from their Tango Ice Blasts. Ben Shapiro to name one. I mean what could be controversial about a Barbie film? Whilst Ben’s 43-minute rant was slightly excessive, to say the least, some of his points do stand.
Oppenheimer has been a point of controversy since the dropping of the atomic bomb. From trying to poison his supervisor, being the father of the atomic bomb and a suspected communist, most who had read a biography (such as this biography of his time at Cambridge) went into Oppenheimer expecting some controversy within the film. However, this was not expected from the Barbie movie. Historically, Barbie has received heavy criticism about perpetuating unrealistic body standards but with its release of several more Barbie dolls, this has been cast to the side. However, there is no denying that the Barbie film was a gender-motivated movie – the idea that women and men couldn’t co-exist harmoniously as equals was prevalent throughout the film with half the film being spent on the struggle between Barbieland being a matriarchy and being overthrown into a patriarchy.
The Barbie film was potentially a way of the Mattel company subverting what was expected of them in the undertones of their film – the high quality, pink themed and generally ‘barbie-esque’ production was all on point; however the political message throughout showed some holes in feminist argument – power, not equality. The idea of Barbie not sticking to what was expected of it was seen a few more times in the film – particularly in the final remarks of the film with Barbie turning into a real woman and going to a gynaecologist. Some have said this is reductive and Barbie’s first taste of being a ‘real woman’ not a doll coming from a gynaecologist visit production have shown what they think a woman is, but from my viewing of Barbie, it was met with a chorus of laughter.
Notably, there has been some discography controversy – ‘Barbie Dreams’ by Fifty-fifty was coined to be the most ‘barbie-esque’ of the Barbie album but was nowhere to be heard before, during or after the film. Whilst this is probably because of the late release of the single and recent issues the K-pop artists are having, some have taken to twitter openly stating their upset about its omission.
With both Oppenheimer and Barbie having a strong pre-release divide, the Instagram and Twitter community converged on what will forever be known as ‘Barbenheimer’ in cinematic history. At first glance most tell incredibly different stories – one of destruction, one of pink-tinted happiness; however, following the films’ release only one remains on the tips of people’s tongues and forefront of people’s minds.
A rocky, desert terrain, a sepia-tinted scene, solemn orchestral music setting the scene. I’m talking about Barbie? Or is it Oppenheimer? or Both?
