Yes, You Should Go See 'Barbie'

I disobeyed Common Sense Media, and you should, too

Note: I’m going to try to write about this film without any real spoilers, but if you want to go into the movie totally blind and knowing nothing (like I did), don’t read this until later.

As a feminist media critic who also used to be obsessed with J. Robert Oppenheimer (don’t ask) it was quite a weekend for me at the box office.

But even Oppenheimer couldn’t compete with a film about Barbie by Greta Gerwig where Ryan Gosling says “boyfriendgirlfriend” as one word. I didn’t need to know anything more.

When I learned people would be taking their young daughters, I ordered my own little girl a pair of upcycled Barbie shorts off Mercari and got us all tickets for Saturday at 3:15.

Is this a film for kids? you might ask.

No, it is not.

Does Common Sense Media recommend this film for children under the age of 11?

No they do not.

In 18+ years of parenting, has that ever stopped me before?

Absolutely not.

But, other than one inadequately-contextualized joke about cellulite, this film is incredible and wonderful for (most) kids.

For adults, I would call it near-perfect. It’s hilarious, it’s deep, it’s touching, it’s heartbreaking, it’s weird AF, and it’s visually intoxicating.

My daughter came for the pink pink pink and stayed for the satirical dance sequences — earnestly appreciating every outfit and catchy pop song. I came for Issa Rae as President and the “beach off” jokes, and stayed for the heartbreakingly perfect portrayal of life as a Gen-X / elder Millennial woman.

I must warn you, however, that despite this being a funny film throughout, I cried almost the entire time.

I started crying the moment Barbie turned to look at the older woman on the bus bench and didn’t stop crying until about ten minutes after we got in the car.

The film hit me hard, but in a joyful way that was so unfamiliar, I didn’t have words to describe it. I guess it was similar to how I felt watching the Netflix series Heartstopper for the first time. If you cried in Heartstopper, you’ll probably cry in Barbie.

My friend Kathleen texted “I felt so SEEN, is that weird?”

“No, it’s not weird,” I texted back, “I did, too!”

Sure, if you look at that Barbie movie image I embedded above, it may seem weird for us as badass women with badass careers to relate so hard. It is a lot of pink. But somehow it’s still a movie about my life, about Kathleen’s, and maybe yours — our joy and our pain.

Barbie getting in trouble for hitting a random man who slapped her on the butt is just one example of the latter — and finding women pretty much everywhere who understand you and want to help you get where you need to be is a great example of the former. (Both of these examples are previewed in the trailer at the top of this post — and don’t worry, Ken isn’t the one who slaps her!)

In one scene, Barbie becomes so overwhelmed by the job of being a woman in a world that both worships and despises us, a prototype Barbie doll is seen spending seven hours scrolling her socials, eating so many Starbursts her jaw hurts, and watching the BBC’s Pride and Prejudice despite already having seen it 700 times.

This descriptor was so accurate and so specific to me, my husband actually went pale.

The Starbursts, the jaw, the loose-fitting clothing and even the P&P are literally exactly me — though I also like the 2005 P&P and the 2022 version of Persuasion and rotate through them all equally in those moments.

On top of all of that, Gerwig made a feature film with a perfectly-placed Indigo Girls song. When it first came on, with Barbie driving her little pink car, my daughter looked at me and shouted, “Mama, we know this song!”

“We do, Baby,” I said to her, “we know every single word.”

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Joanna Schroeder is an author, editor and media critic, and mother to kids ranging from 5 to 18 years old. Her book, Talk To Your Boys, co-written with Christopher Pepper, is coming Spring 2025 via Workman Publishing.