#and the truman show but make it barbie

[sunny-rants]

2023 out here beating the “cinema is dead” allegations with pure camp

[thursdayglrl]

oppenheimer gf this barbie gf that what about staying home watching movies that make your parents go "oh that's really old" when they walk in the room gf

[space-blue]

Not that many care about my opinion on the topic, but I cannot comprehend the takes I've seen on Oppenheimer prior to viewing the film.

I'm just out of the cinema and I cannooooot believe that I've heard and seen people complain about the "Americans clapping" scene as not sensitive, and that it should have shown the bombs dropped and the damage done. I've read takes that came down to 'the film is PRAISING the bomb by refusing to show its damage' and holy shit I was bracing myself.

But not only is the clapping scene shot like the genre just switched to horror, plunging us into very interesting exploration of the mental dissonance Oppenheimer is going through at that moment... I was left wondering...

Have those critics not seen Grave of the Fireflies? Barefoot Gen? In This Corner of the World? Watched documentaries on the bombs, on hibakushas? Have they not read the Hiroshima book by John Hersey that collects horrifying first hand accounts of Hiroshima survivors?

Have they stepped into the theatre with no background understanding of the atomic bomb and the horrors it carried?

Because this entire scene, actually much of Oppenheimer's mindset post bomb drop, DEPENDS on the public's understanding of WHAT THE PEOPLE ARE CLAPPING FOR. They're clapping for their project completion, for their victory, and for unknown amount of dead people. And WE KNOW that they are clapping for some of the most horrifying shit ever. We know they're clapping the cold war and nuclear proliferation's birth.

The film relies on you understanding this! The film depends on you activating your neurons and putting 2 and 2 together.

The film treats the audience as adults who don't need to see dead civilians to EMPATHISE for those civilians. You're also meant to be alienated from these cheering scientists, just as you can't help understanding why they're cheering.

It makes sense yet it's awful. Dissonance.

If you need your hand held so bad to understand why the bomb is a great evil, no matter how necessary it might have felt, when watching a biopic, then maybe you should have stuck to Barbie only, as that film was fun but significantly less challenging.

Also damn but Gary Oldman as Truman was so terrific, this guy really is a million faces.

[wandering-alien]

'Oppenheimer' is actually a really interesting exploration into masculinity and gender. Bear in mind I've only watched the film once and my thoughts aren't entirely coherent but I wanted to share some.

Robert and Kitty's relationship is really intriguing and an insight into relationships and gender dynamics of the time. Kitty is suffocated by her kids and role as a mother but pushes through and sticks by Robert's side, not only because she's really loyal but because that's what women were expected to do. She's sacrificed a lot of her happiness and now her husband is a great man of history.

We see Robert Oppenheimer in a very emotional light, with close ups of Murphy's amazing acting really driving this home. It's good to see how someone in Oppenheimer's position would actually behave, and the stress and anxiety he feels is built into the film. At one point, Truman calls Oppenheimer a 'crybaby' and it really reminded me how important the obvious showing of Oppenheimer's emotions is in this film. Not only does it help us connect with him as a character, but it's acknowledging men's emotions and a fact that this male character can be and is vulnerable (which is an idea reinforced by the scenes in the board room).

Also just the general details, like the chemist arguing with another member of the team because he doesn't understand female anatomy and acts like she can't properly do her work. Really reminds you that it was a different time.

Sorry if none of this makes sense or if it seems a bit off, just what I took away from the film, especially because I saw 'Barbie' a few days before and that was very focused on gender as a theme.

[superectojazzmage]

As far as I can tell, the reason the Barbie movie is gonna be good is because they made literally the most unhinged possible choice for director and that director herself possesses the most unhinged takes on her work and the source material imaginable. Literally who else but Greta Gerwig would get hired to make a movie about a children’s doll and immediately proceed to cite influence from classic dystopian cinema like Truman Show and Brazil while describing how Barbie is a Christ figure. Absolute queen behavior.

[robotpussy]

yeah tbh the barbie movie is being hyped up and i have only ever seen people excited for barbie and kens dynamic and ofc the glitter pink aes or whatever but literally have not seen one person really intrigued by the plot line so far. which makes me believe that it's so uninteresting people are already clinging to other enjoyable aspects of the film and i think when it's out people will continue doing that.

i really feel like its going to look nice like yyou said and might have a few funny moments here and there (truly believe most of it will be annoyingly unfunny tho), but with a boring ass story. i think it will be something like that bratz live action film mixed with other girl power 2000s movies yeah.

sorry for taking so long to answer this but I feel like the teaser made people hype it up so much their expectations are so high and the amazing production design and references are getting them excited because after that official trailer that came out I could immediately tell it was just going to be a meta comedy at the start and then like.... a ordinary comedy once Barbie gets to the real world.

and in terms of the story, I'm not surprised by it because what can you do with Barbie? I knew it would just be about her coming to life and seeing the real world that's how most of these movies play out. people were saying so much of the plot was hidden but it really is as clear as day? it's a homage to the wizard of oz, and perhaps the truman show too. Barbie will experience misogyny once she gets to the real world, she will discover the patriarchy, ken may also become a misogynist (that one clip on the trailer where he doesn't believe the woman he's talking to is a doctor and wants a man to look at him is questionable considering where he is from and I'm sure all the doctors in Barbieland are women....) and Barbie will learn what it means to be human/becomes human 🤷🏾‍♀️ like idk

I truly do think it's going to be on the same lines as like... pitch perfect comedy or something. I know people like that kind of comedy but there are always very few jokes that land, and yea people already praising it as this big pink feminist film is making me roll my eyes like I'm sorry 😭

[men-of-colors]

Yesterday I finally saw “Barbie”, required watching for both the Woke and the AntiWoke.

Ryan Gosling never looked so buff or Simu Liu so sexy.

But I’m not here to talk about them.

There was something wrong that I could not place my finger on and after getting home I looked at several Barbie-sucks YouTube videos. They all had a point but weren’t quite MY point.

In Barbieland, the Barbies and Kens all live totally separate existences but also get along in perfect harmony. Nobody seems to give a second thought that the Barbies hold all positions of importance, all the way down to the janitors (arguably important because they actually hold a job), while the Kens are LITERALLY just decoration. Genitalia, thus libido per se, does not exist so neither does romance nor drama between the sexes. True, the Kens seem a little frustrated, but they manage while in truth there is nothing substantial going in the Barbies’ lives either.

At Barbie’s dream house, every night is “girl’s night”. Nobody knows what happens to the Kens at night, not even where they supposedly live. Girls hang with girls and boys with boys.

In other words, it’s a queer, queer, queer, queer world. Queer and peaceful and happy. All the fucking time. But of course no one fucks at all. Or ever. All that Ken meat and muscle around and not even a neck rub.

All that changes after Ken has seen the human world where Kens (men) are not just decoration but have this thing called Patriarchy which makes them important. And they have horses. Ken realizes this is what Barbieland needs: Patriarchy!

Ken gets back to B-land before Barbie does and gets to work. In what seems to be the space of a few hours, B-land is totally transformed and all the Kens have seduced the Barbies and are acting like rednecks. With mini-fridges full of beer.

Stereotype-Barbie returns horrified. B-land has become sexualized, and heterosexualized at that!

We’re not in Pleasantville anymore... (Speaking of which, Reese Witherspoon would have been much better as Barbie than Margot Robbie)

The fact that Stereo Barbie is horrified and works hard to get Barbieland back to the way it was (Pleasantville style), is what horrified so many reviewers. But others say that is exactly the point. But again, I’m not going there.

I had another take.

Seeing how in Barbieland, no one goes hungry (they can’t eat), they can beach all day and dance all night, and boys and girls are allowed (meant?) to live separate lives, it seems like a total queer utopia.

So the sudden loss of innocence in the Ken boytoys was particular poignant from

the perspective of a gay kid.

For most queersons, puberty is a time when their whole lives —fantasies and all—are reduced to a shambles, and they spend the next several decades trying to put everything back together again, only in a different grown-up version. There are no blueprints or social guidelines that serve as hints along the way.

So yeah, I understand Barbie’s horror though not for the same reasons. You can never go back to how it was.

What happened after that, well you can go see it yourself and see where you might fit in.

Anyway, I was hoping for some kind of funky version of La La Land mixed in with Pleasantville and the Truman Show, but Barbie was no La La Land. And that’s OK I guess.

You go out and watch it and see for yourself.

[watercanjanet]

One of the things that bothers me most about barbie is how it is seemingly a “breakthrough to the real-world” theme similar to Truman show’s simulated reality themes. However, Truman show was about breaking away from the controlling creator and the narrative of being held captive by a corporation profiteering off of him. The sheer anger he displays from being exploited is valid and empowering.

But the barbie movie on the other hand was produced by Mattel and there was never a chance for barbie to be angry at capitalism and how her idea of feminism was essentially “girl-boss capitalist feminism” and nothing more because she was in-fact controlled by a corporate. The movie suddenly flips toward the Ken’s taking over narrative and never really takes a moment to actually address the issues that Ariana Greenblatt points out (which in essence is about Mattel and not a single innocent barbie ?)

While I liked the messaging about patriarchy by holding up a mirror to the society bit, I simply couldn’t get over the fact that art (which has been a form of liberation) and capitalism came together to to successfully make a brand ad film about empowerment? I enjoyed the movie and I think we finally have a chick-flick that I can rewatch with my friends for fun but I don’t think it’s anything more than an intro to feminism type of a film.

I hate that conservatives are calling it anti-men, etc. and not giving way to any real criticism of the movie.

[pyrocortex]

Having just completed the barbenheimer double bill I have some initial thoughts

The first is that the experience is peak cinema. The rest are mildly spoilery so they're below the cut.

My near immediate thoughts on Oppenheimer is that alot of my almost critisms are kinda muted (for lack of a better word) by the fact the film was called Oppenheimer. It didn't delve nearly as much into the more board strokes of the Manhattan project (like Los Alamos itself, or the bombings, or the people who suffered and died due to the three bombs he directly oversaw, or the long term impact of mass nuclear proliferation) but also... The film wasn't called the Manhattan Project, or Los Alamos, or Trinity, or Little boy and Fat man, or Nuclear Fallout or any other number of titles that would indicate a focus on the nuclear aspect of the second world war. It's Oppenheimer, a complicated biopic about a complicated man that begins some time in the 1920s and ends some time in the 1960s and is alot more about the man than the war he "won".

Not that this renders the movie free from criticisms on that front. Honestly I feel the movie is maybe too gentle on the man and his apocalyptic body count, and is probably not as strongly anti-war as the movie thinks it is, especially without any examination of whether Japan would have surrendered without the bombs. Plus the additional angle of "making a biopic about Oppenheimer that glosses over the real people his invention hurt" is, while a choice that makes sense on paper for the sake of keeping the movie right and focused, does take away the weight of what he did.

Then again, as a friend pointed out, having the only presence of Japanese people in the movie be nuclear irradiated corpses would be in poor taste at best and probably qualifies as exploitative at minimum. Plus, as Truman (or at least, Oppenheimer's Truman) points out, Oppenheimer and his team may have built the bombs, but he (Truman) ordered them dropped. Raises the question who deserves more blame, the man who builds the gun, or the one that shoots it?

Honestly I think the movie did an impressive thing in making me both sympathize with Oppenheimer's reasoning for building the bomb (once Fission was achieved, the obvious application for the energy output being a bomb, the Einstein-Szilard letter only doubling down on this fact, it being viewed in 1942 not as a question of whether nuclear bombs would be built, but who would build them first the Americans or the Nazis (Oppenheimer, a Jew, really understandably would rather it not be the fucking Nazis)) and also have me lose that sympathy as the Trinity test neared (once Germany surrendered, it felt like the "arms race" excuse was lost and the reason Oppenheimer kept going was just pure momentum, especially as the humanitarian concerns built and built and built). And in the end, Strauss was probably right about Oppenheimer, he was a man trying to put the genie back in the bottle without regretting having let the genie out in the first place. Complicated man, not necessarily a good one, but one that maybe I understand after watching the movie.

But that end scene... It gave me fucking chills make no mistake. Even if the rest of the movie probably didn't quite have the strength of that scene's conviction.

As for Barbie... She's everything.

No seriously, while with Oppenheimer I'm having complicated thoughts about whether it's possible for that movie to be truly anti-war if it never shows war, or anti nuclear proliferation if it never show a single victim, with Barbie I'm just like... Hell yeah this is cinema.

It probably also shares some of Oppenheimer's flaws, not quite going all the way when it comes to its themes but also shares the fact it was made with buckets of talent, buckets of money, and with an infectious love of movies as an art form.

Possibly I'd have more thoughts about Barbie if that had been the movie I'd seen first, and had more time to stew on it, but as it is trying to understand a Nolan film might have fried my brain for the day.

Broad strokes though: loved the camp, loved the singing and dancing, loved the humour, loved the heart, loved the examination of gender and society, wish it was more queer, wish it had more bitting critiques of corporations, Barbie is everything.

[arowrath]

tghere have just been so many things happening to me that make me feel like i'm the main character of a tv show written by some lame cishet white dude who thinks tormenting the same character over and over is a good plot and that sexual assault jokes are really funny. like if whoever wrote season 12 of criminalminds met one of the guys who wrote south park. but if it was like... the truman show. i don't know what the truman show is but i've heard genloss and barbie compared to it, so. Well anyway my point is that god is real and he thinks he's real fucking funny -_-

[moonshinemagpie]

in which I see Real Movies for the very first time

When I looked back on the movies I watched in 2023, I was a little sad to realize I had only watched a bunch of Scooby-Doo movies, Barbie (which was stupid), Jennifer Lawrence's comedy No Hard Feelings (which was also stupid), and Die Hard (which I hated).

Near the end of December I was trying to force myself through the Mario movie, because it was on Netflix and a bunch of people had told me to see it. And I was about 15 minutes in and found myself thinking, I wish I were dead. There's more than an hour left and I have lost my will to live.

And then I remembered: I did not have to watch the Mario movie.

I can't explain this. It was like waking up from a spell.

I stopped the movie. I thought, Movies are for normalizing exploitative, hypermasculine violence and selling toys. I will never watch another movie ever again.

Then I thought: Is it movies I don't like? Or is it corporate, militaristic americana bullshit?

I did not know the answer. I decided to try to find the answer by starting my New Years resolution: Stop Watching Bad Movies I Hate and Watch Good Ones Instead.

Here's what I've seen so far, in order:

14 movies. 4 languages. 4 new releases. 1 classic. 5 women directors. 1 rewatch. An unexpected number of anti-imperialist Irish movies.

Yeah, so. I like movies. A lot, maybe. This month I felt like I traveled to London, Belfast, Lima, Tehran, Kampala, Mexico City, Paris, and New Zealand, and it was awesome.

Mini reviews:

Tar: Literally the best movie I've ever seen. Psychological, surreal, intense. A++

Hunger: Says "fuck you" to traditional storytelling arcs and also to the British. A+

Skinamarink: It didn't scare me but I respect its decisions. C

Charade: At one point Audrey Hepburn dips her finger into Cary Grant's chin cleft and says, "How do you shave in there?" At a later point Cary Grant says to her, "Hasn't it occurred to you that I'm having a tough time keeping my hands off you?" These moments were A+, but: This was like a proto-action movie, complete with chase scenes and shootouts, and I was so bored despite Audrey Hepburn being in it. It made me wonder: What if I refuse to watch any more movies that use violence for entertainment for the rest of 2024? What if?? Who can stop me???

The Wind that Shakes the Barley: A young Cillian Murphy fights the English in 1920's Ireland. Lots of violence but none of it for entertainment. A+

Kneecap: The true story of 3 Irish-language rappers from Belfast. I forgot how fun it is to watch high people perform on stage. A hilarious, well-written, well-plotted middle finger. A++

Don't Worry Darling: This deserves more acclaim than it got and I blame misogyny. The Truman Show but more thoughtful. A+

Lord of the Rings: You don't need me to review LOTR.

Sujo: About the son of a Mexican cartel gunman trying to break a cycle of violence. Slow, well-shot. B

Sebastian: About a gay writer in London who uses sex work to inform his fiction. Overlong. I recommend the French film Eastern Boys instead. B-

Reinas: About a Peruvian family in the 1990's trying to emigrate to the US. Made me remember my own childhood and also made me desperately want to visit Lima. Bright, beautiful, touching, with a dope soundtrack. A+

No Bears: Meta, fourth-wall-breaking Iranian film about a director named Jafar Panahi who's in trouble with the authorities. Directed by Jafar Panahi, who was shortly after imprisoned. A+

Belfast: About 1960's Belfast. A little simplistic. Not as good as the other Irish history films I saw this month. B

Queen of Katwe: Based on the real-life Ugandan chess champion Phiona Mutesi, who recently said she unreservedly loves this film. It's better imo than The Queen's Gambit. Chess isn't about making it to the world championship. Chess is about what keeps you afloat when your house floods. Chess is about showing up even when it's hard. Chess is about fulfilling the dream of one day buying your mama a home. A rare "inspirational" Disney film that didn't feel fake. A+

Going forward:

I want to watch more world cinema! Guys! I'd only ever seen one other film in Spanish in my whole life. This was my first time seeing an Iranian film. This is mostly because I didn't watch many movies to start with, but, again, maybe I would have watched more if it had dawned on me that I don't have to see cars driving fast after other cars in the last 30 minutes of every single god damned film.

I don't want to watch any action films this year. I'm so exhausted. I'm so tired. Hollywood, I think I hate you.

I want to watch weird whacky Japanese New Wave films and films about the Spanish Civil War and films that remind me of parts of my own childhood I haven't thought about in 15 years.

I feel so alive!!!

[jaysgirlx]

𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐊𝐋𝐄𝐎 !!

hi i'm kleo aka ayo!! i'm a woc, my pronouns are she/her, i identify as pansexual, my personality type is entp, i'm a sagittarius and i'm lawyer in the making.

relationship status: single & heavily confused.

current obsession: a 3ds that i bought since my parents wouldn't let me have one growing up. it's even light pink!!

YES !! anything red, riting, legal studies, comics, animanga, lipgloss, cooking, bell-bottoms, winter, fast replies to texts, late nights, cuddling, over ear headphones, classic literature, legos, mini skirts, videogames, drinks with caffeine, attention, affection, hot pretzels, skateboarding, motorcycles, criminal justice, and always listening to music.

NO !! liars, entitled men, bugs, country music, my insomnia, bad wifi, bad hair days, double standards, pick mes, arriving late to functions, slow walkers, any form of discrimination and being broke.

FAVE SHOWS !! degrassi, suits, carmen sandiego, the bear, criminal minds, abbott elementary, the boys, camp camp, you, bridgerton, inside job, young & hungry, rwby, business proposal, cyberpunk: edgerunners, boy meets world, rick and morty, violet evergarden, atla/lok, and gilmore girls.

FAVE MOVIES !! 10 things i hate about you, atsv, a silent voice, black panther, clueless, httyd & trolls trilogy, now you see me, the princess and the frog, the batman, og monster high, the truman show, barbie, ocean's 8, bullet train, legally blonde, pretty woman and (500) days of summer.

FAVE ARTISTS !! arctic monkeys, bruno mars, megan thee stallion, twice, beyoncé, lady gaga, aepsa, burna boy, mitski, lay bankz, sabrina carpenter, flo milli, jungkook, laufey, sza, the neighborhood, metro booming, the weekend, stray kids, kendrick lamar, davido, willow, doja cat and the strokes.

[svankmajerbaby]

A Brief (?) Analysis of the Barbie (2023) Teaser

here’s the teaser itself btw

ok So. first of all getting a teaser that looks so polished this early on (considering this comes out in July) is kind of amazing. it makes me wonder just how much special effects it will have, and if there’s any particular reason for it to be released specifically in july of 2023 (apart from competing with nolan’s latest).

but to what matters: i have three big questions regarding this movie so far. 1. who’s the target audience, 2. what time it is set in, 3. what place it is set in. all of them are more ambiguous than it sounds.

1. who’s the target audience

we don’t get a mpaa rating, but i’m gonna assume it will be pg-13 (as most movies are nowadays it feels like). i do not believe this will be targeted towards kids, which makes me curious to what sort of message it will try to send its audience and what themes it’s trying to convey. from the admittedly unreliable original plot that was announced, in which barbie is kicked out of barbieland for not being “perfect” enough (which tbh i dont love as a base concept), i had a feeling this would be a sort of enchanted 2007-style movie. barbie has to leave her dreamhouse for the grimy reality, ken might chase after her through the real world to bring her back, maybe will ferrel’s big bad executive discovers shes left and tries to ‘discontinue’ her or something, barbie will learn about self-acceptance or bravery or self-reliance or her own inner strength along the way, happy ending. i want to give gerwig and baumbach a little more credit, though, and say that they can do something more interesting. not being focused on sending a positive message to kids, and hopefully being allowed by mattel to actually put barbie in challenging situations can help this happen.

also, there has been (again, unreliable) reports on the movies that influenced this barbie feature: where i had thought, thinking of a children’s movie version, about enchanted 2007 meets the lego movie 2014, or even something like legally blonde 2001, theres jacques demy movies and the truman show 1998 --which i think is absolutely fascinating. this does promise a more “grown up” narrative, which im excited to see.

2. what time it is set in

one of the first images we see are of little girls playing with baby dolls, dressed in this old-timey but still twentieth century fashion.... considering the reveal at the end of this sequence, it would be safe to say they’re meant to be 1950s little girls. i have a feeling this sequence is either just for the teaser or it won’t have much actual weight in the movie --it’s meant to be a joke, is what im trying to say. still, it does give a glimpse of what the general style and tone of the movie will be like.

(this is also just a detail but i love how the girls’ clothes are all in these dusty dirt tones that make them blend with the background, its very much in line with how “life was all dull and grim until Barbie™ showed up!!”)

and also, it makes the pink pop out, of course. but the lettering is usually a great indicator of tone and time a movie is set in: and this lettering in particular, used around the late 1970s throughout the 1980s, i think is really good to make a guess. i don’t think the movie will be set in any particular time (at least not the scenes in “barbieland”, but more on that later) but choosing a styling more associated with the 80s does make the story one that is less focused on modern critiques and successes associated with the brand and more on the nostalgic feeling of the doll itself. separating the modern brand from the past also allows for a much broader critique, which makes for any self-aware jokes much easier than if it mocked decisions made by modern-day mattel, is what i mean (this is what i meant by associating it with enchanted 2007: the disney movie was made decades after the cliches it mocks, like the helpless princess who sings to animals and marries the prince rightaway, so at least to me it was funny but not particularly topical or timely. like a modern mocking of victorian corset-wearing, its not the sort of critiques i find particularly urgent or interesting to make)

3. what place it’s set in

the united states of course, probably los angeles --but i mean it in what reality its gonna be set. from my enchanted-meets-lego movie perspective, i thought it would differentiate between the barbieland (the clear artificial space these characters inhabit) and the real world (where barbie goes to learn a valuable lesson)

(the lack of privacy is astounding, which, if we are really going to go the truman show route, is pretty cool in and of itself. and also an amazing feat of set design, if it’s all real sets)

the teaser shows all “artificial” spaces, which by the production design all seem part of barbieland. i’m assuming its to convey the fun glitzy comedy tone of the movie so far, which would probably be more developed once we get a full length trailer. though, if the whole movie is set in barbieland (since those reports of the plot are admittedly pretty old and i think gerwig and baumbach have done extensive rewrites, if not a complete overhauling of the script), that could also be very interesting. by not having a parallel reality, we would have to see barbie develop own opinions and change this whole society from the ground up, instead of having the influence of a real world’s views affecting her and pushing her to change. i don’t think thats truly the case (the existence of will ferrel’s lord business-style matter executive villain/antagonist throws a wrench on this theory) but it would still be fun to see.

all in all, even with a brief teaser we get a lot of info. i believe so far that this will not be meant to be a children’s movie (so any hopes that it will do a shoutout to the direct-to-video movies are rather moot), it will focus on a nostalgic version of barbie instead of any set in the present or in an actual time period, and that at least the reports of there being a “barbieland” are true. it exists, and its plastic, and fantastic, and very, very pink

[thedaveandkimmershow]

To be honest, it wasn't on our radar to see "Barbie". It wasn't even on our radar to see "Oppenheimer" even as the term "Barbenheimer" made its way into our awareness. In fact, the only next movie we have on our radar is "Wonka" that's gonna be our Christmas Day family movie this year.

So then Linzy sees "Barbie" and the very next Discount Tuesday we're sitting in a packed Crest Theater with the big bag of buttered popcorn that's the best theater popcorn.

Ever.

It's an interesting day, by the way, this day we go see "Barbie".

Why?

Because Kimmer's up in Edmonds/Mukilteo, Linzy's down in Seattle, I'm in Madrona for the day, and the Crest is in Shoreline. What we do, then, is we all plan to meet up at the Crest at 7 for the 730 showing. I leave work around 530, meet Linzy at the light rail station at 6. After the light rail, we grab a bus that drops us directly across the street from the Crest where we can see a line out the door, up the sidewalk, to the parking lot.

Whoops. Maybe we're here a little late.

Meanwhile, Kimmer's parked near the bus stop and we all walk across the street to the box office where we learn that the line out the door's for people who bought their tickets online. So we score our tickets right there, the girls head straight into the theater, and I get in the next line for the popcorn.

By the way, I did not wear pink to the event. I wasn't planning on any particular color, actually.

However.

Through my own peculiar habits of choosing what to wear in the morning with as little thought as possible, I wound up wearing all blue to the movie.

Seriously. Go figure.

As for the movie itself, there's a lot to unpack. I'll probably watch it again at some point (some point after Oppenheimer). It's fun to watch, definitely. It's filled with a lot of laugh out loud moments on top of a metric ton of nostalgia. It's creative as hell, great casting (did not see Rhea Perlman coming, for example), wonderful performances all around. Definitely a lot of social commentary that, in a nearly full theater, resonated with a lot of different people at different times according to their experiences... as well as lighting up universals that are obvious (of course) to everyone.

The stunning thing about the movie is how successfully it moves through tonal shifts including, in my opinion, the final scene between Rhea Perlman and Margo Robbie that transcends to an incredibly moving level: a combination, in its own way, of the final scene between Truman and Christof from "The Truman Show"... and that scene from early in Pixar's "Up" where the filmmakers take us through the relationship of Ellie and Carl without dialog or narration.

It was this purely emotional experience that only film makes possible.

😊

[denimbex1986]

'Barbenheimer day is finally almost here. The most anticipated A-list showdown since 50 Cent vs. Kanye West in 2007 has fueled double feature ticket sales, earned support from other summer stars, and fueled an entire cottage industry of tweets, memes, and custom merch. But the question hanging over the dual blockbusters has been a simple one—are they actually good movies?

Barbie, in particular, has kept its actual plot details under extremely tight wraps, even as Greta Gerwig, Margot Robbie, and Ryan Gosling have been on an elite charm offensive on the promo circuit. Oppenheimer, obviously draws from historical events and the Pulitzer Prize-winning biography American Prometheus, but Christopher Nolan has shown with Dunkirk and the Nikola Tesla character in The Prestige that he’s willing to put his distinct Nolanian spin on historical facts and figures.

With release day fast approaching, critical reactions to the two movies have begun to roll out—and the good news is they’ve been massively positive. Barbie got the inside lane by lifting its review embargo the evening of July 18, as opposed to midday on the 19th for Oppenheimer. Greta Gerwig’s big swing has hailed at as an ambitious, madcap movie with Indiewire praising the writing, production design, and the…Kens? “All Barbies delight, but the Kens, appropriately enough, launch a real sneak attack, especially Simu Liu and Kingsley Ben-Adir, and Michael Cera nearly makes off with the whole thing as the singular sidekick Allan,” wrote Kate Erbland. Variety highlighted the movie’s “high-concept” nature and its ability to grapple with issues related to harmful, unattainable beauty standards. “Gerwig has made the kind of family film she surely wishes had been available to her when she was a girl, sneaking a message (several of them, really) inside Barbie’s hollow hourglass figure,” Peter Debruge said.

Writing for RogerEbert.com, Christy Lemire said the juxtaposition between the “real world” and a seeming utopia is reminiscent of The Truman Show or The Lego Movie, but that Gerwig’s direction brings a distinct perspective to the film. Lemire praised the work of Robbie and the way her Barbie character deepens as the film progresses.

Not everyone was sold on Barbie though: Richard Lawson, reviewing for Vanity Fair, wrote that there “are a few laugh-out-loud gags in the film, but just as many jokes clunk around like cheap plastic. The script is so strenuously wacky that it runs the movie ragged pretty quickly.” Meanwhile for Vulture, critic Allison Willmore argued that just because the film features a beloved auteur gamely taking on corporate IP, its success shouldn’t be graded on a curve: “There’s a streak of defensiveness to Barbie, as though it’s trying to anticipate and acknowledge any critiques lodged against it before they’re made, which renders it emotionally inert despite the efforts at wackiness.”

Oppenheimer praise has been a bit more effusive so far. One viewer who couldn’t care less about embargoes is Academy Award winner Paul Schrader, who wrote a glowing review of the movie on his Facebook page. “The best, most important film of this century. If you see one film in cinemas this year it should be Oppenheimer. I’m not a Nolan groupie but this one blows the doors off the hinges,” he said. (Schrader co-wrote Raging Bull and Taxi Driver, and has directed incredible films like First Reformed, so his reverence certainly carries weight.)

The Hollywood Reporter noted that the movie is more calculated and contemplative than high-octane action thriller. “Perhaps the most surprising element of this audacious epic is that the scramble for atomic armament ends up secondary to the scathing depiction of political gamesmanship,” David Rooney wrote. In a review for RogerEbert.com, Matt Zoller Seitz said that what matters most in Oppenheimer is “the human face,” praising Nolan’s use of intimate close-ups on not only Cillian Murphy, but also supporting characters like Emily Blunt and Matt Damon. (Zoller Seitz also notes that the actual effects of the atomic bomb being dropped in Japan are “talked about but never shown,” noting potential backlash from audiences who wanted the decision as an act of war to be reckoned with more explicitly.)

As Keith Phipps wrote, pitting the two movies against each other is ultimately the wrong conversation to be having, fun though it may be. Both seem to be deeply original, ambiguous works from within the Hollywood system, the kinds of things we just don’t get enough of anymore. Besides, the box office battle seems to be over before it ever started, with Barbie projected to eclipse Oppenheimer on opening weekend —but if anyone has ruled the summer with a commanding consistency for the last decade, it’s Christopher Nolan.'

[commissionsdarian]

A controversial opinion you have?

The movie watching order should be Barbie, then Oppenheimer. Of course Barbie could be the cooldown movie, but where's the fun in that? Plus you're underestimating the stuff they could be exploring in it, fingers crossed they're going for Truman Show existentialism while trying to make it seem like a happy movie for younger audiences. Those darker underlayers are hopefully going to set the stage for Oppenheimer. If not, imagine the tone change. If you're willingly going to watch that movie, you want it to be as dramatic and devastating as possible. So you're gonna want to let it completely rip away the pleasantries of the Barbie movie, as well as not watching anything cheerful after it to allow for it to properly set in