Barbie: Far more than a plastic toy

Barbie (2023) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, and needlessly, for suggestive references and fleeting profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.4.23

This must be one of the most unusual ideas ever pitched to a Hollywood film studio. 

 

I’d love to have been a bug on the wall during that concept meeting.

 

Total catastrophe! Barbie (Margot Robbie, center) is dismayed to discover that her
perfectly arched feet have become flat. Her fellow Barbies — from left, Ana Cruz Kayne,
Sharon Rooney, Alexandra Shipp, Hari Nef and Emma Mackey — are similarly
horrified.

And yet, defying expectations — of some silly, frilly bit of toy-themed fluff akin to 1986’s My Little Pony — this film is thoughtful, audaciously subversive, and one of the most insightful indictments of gender stereotypes ever unleashed.

It’s also quite funny.

 

And pink. Very, very pink.

 

Director/co-scripter Greta Gerwig — along with writing partner Noah Baumbach — have concocted an immersive “Barbie experience” that playfully honors the iconic Mattel doll’s 64-year legacy, while contrasting her idealized realm with the harsher truths of our real world.

 

Although such progressive thoughts certainly weren’t contemplated when the first Barbie hit store shelves on March 9, 1959 — your choice of blonde or brunette — Mattel soon employed the doll as a subtle means of girl empowerment. Barbie could be anything: a doctor, lawyer or scientist; tennis champ or ace baseball player; astronaut, Supreme Court justice or even president of the United States.

 

(Granted, this was primarily marketing savvy; the actual goal was to make money. But if a little idealism rubbed off along the way, so much the better.)

 

Thus — following a hilarious prologue that lampoons the opening sequence in 1968’s 2001: A Space Odyssey — we meet pert, perky “Stereotypical Barbie” (Margot Robbie), as she wakens to enjoy another in an impossibly long line of perfect days.

 

Identically perfect days.

 

She rises, greets the Barbies in adjacent dream houses, showers beneath invisible water, enjoys breakfast while drinking invisible milk, and opens her magic wardrobe to get her outfit for the day: a bit of spin, and poof, it’s on her body. Sarah Greenwood’s production design is as amazing and colorfully inventive as Jacqueline Durran’s costumes. (Who knew pink came in so many shades?)

 

Since Barbie’s dream house has no stairs, and is open at the front, she merely steps off the edge and floats to the ground below. (Newton’s laws don’t exist in Barbie Land, nor does wind, gravity or anything else that might interfere with this realm’s pink perfection.)

 

Love and Monsters: Quite a ride

Love and Monsters (2020) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for sci-fi violence and mild profanity

Available via: Hulu

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.3.21

A movie with a title like this, is either going to be a lot of fun … or a stinker.

 

Happily, the former is true.

 

Joel (Dylan O'Brien) finds that his new canine companion is quite useful in what has
become an extremely dangerous world.

Director Michael Matthews’ audacious adventure thriller was the dark-horse candidate for last year’s visual effects Academy Award, and Brian Cox’s team definitely earned their place on that short list. On top of which, this film is far more entertaining than the category winner (Christopher Nolan’s overblown Tenet).

I know we’ve been deluged by “giant monster” movies of late — Godzilla, King Kong, Pacific Rim and so forth — but this one’s different. In addition to the terrific effects, the secondary attraction is Brian Duffield and Matthew Robinson’s cheeky script, which goes a long way toward turning star Dylan O’Brien into a most unlikely action hero.

 

On top of which, local viewers will get a kick out of the fact that some of these events are set in Fairfield, of all places. (Filming actually took place in Australia.)

 

At some point into the future, a massive asteroid threatens to wreak havoc when it hits Earth. Governments cooperatively scramble to successfully destroy it, but the process blankets our planet with a chemical residue that causes cold-blooded animals — bugs, amphibians, sea creatures — to mutate into huge monsters that soon kill off (um, devour) most of humanity.

 

The United States’ few survivors have holed up in underground bunker “colonies” spread throughout the country, which maintain contact with each other via short wave radio. Joel (O’Brien), belonging to one such colony, is something of a misfit. Everybody is kind — they love his minestrone (!) — but he feels useless.

 

He isn’t strong or brave enough to join his older comrades when they go topside to forage for supplies, a dangerous endeavor that often has tragic consequences.

 

Worse yet, he’s the colony’s only singleton; everybody else has paired off. He nurses the memory of his former girlfriend, Aimee (Jessica Henwick), whom he hasn’t seen since they were separated seven years earlier, during the evacuation of Fairfield. He knows where she is — another colony, 85 miles away, on the California coast — but that doesn’t help much.

 

When his colony is breached by a giant ant, with disastrous consequences, Joel decides he’d rather die trying to reunite with Aimee, than spend whatever remains of his life cowering in a hole. And so he grabs a crossbow and a backpack’s worth of supplies, and heads topside. Nobody tries to stop him; they all understand.

 

Needless to say, his quest proves quite hazardous.

Boss Baby: Family Business — Nonstop hilarity

Boss Baby: Family Business (2021) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG, for mild rude humor

Available via: Movie theaters and Peacock

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.2.21

Hang on a moment; I need to catch my breath.

 

(Whew!)

 

Tim is astonished to discover that his infant daughter Tina actually is a clandestine
operative from Baby Corp, sent to recruit him for a super-secret mission.

Calling the momentum of this animated sequel “brisk” doesn't do it justice; director Tom McGrath’s hilarious romp is mega-prestissimo. This is blink-and-you-miss-stuff pacing.

McGrath took the same approach when he helmed 2017’s Boss Baby, so we shouldn’t be surprised; that said, this one feels even more frantic … which isn’t always a good thing. Michael McCullers’ script stumbles a bit out of the gate; the initial 15 to 20 minutes are too randomly chaotic, as if the story has trouble deciding which direction to take.

 

This sequel also assumes intimate knowledge of its predecessor. Viewers starting here will be overwhelmed by the preliminary information dump, along with the workings — and gadgets — of BabyCorp, the clandestine organization that carefully monitors the health of the “pie chart of love” between all the world’s parents and their children.

 

(Just in passing, I’ve always argued that a sequel should stand on its own; failure to do so suggests filmmaking arrogance.)  

 

The ride smoothes out once the core plot is established, and the feverish velocity feels more in service of the action, and less an affectation for its own sake.

 

Many years have passed. Tim (voiced by James Marsden) and his younger brother Ted (Alec Baldwin) have become adults, and drifted away from each other. Tim and his wife Carol (Eva Longoria) have two young daughters: Tabitha (Ariana Greenblatt), a whip-smart 7-year-old; and newly arrived infant Tina (Amy Sedaris).

 

Ted, the former “boss baby,” has put his business savvy to excellent use, and become a successful hedge fund CEO. He acknowledges all birthdays and important holidays with piles of lavish gifts, but rarely visits; he’s always “too busy.” This is particularly distressing for Tabitha, who idolizes her rarely seen uncle, and hopes to become just like him.

 

This worries Tim — still very much in touch with his childhood imagination — who fears that his elder daughter works too hard, and is missing out on childhood joys. Indeed, she’s top of her class at the prestigious Acorn Center for Advanced Childhood, which seems to be molding her into an obsessed Renaissance scholar.

The One and Only Ivan: A noble hero

The One and Only Ivan (2020) • View trailer 

3.5 stars. Rated PG, for mild dramatic intensity

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.4.20 

Break out the Kleenex; you’ll be snuffling before this gentle little fable concludes its first act.

 

Which is not to say that The One and Only Ivan, debuting on Disney+, is an unrelenting tear-jerker; far from it. But by replicating the “gimmick” from Katherine Applegate’s Newbery Medal-winning 2012 children’s novel — in which the title character, a silverback gorilla, narrates his own story — scripter Mike White puts us squarely into this intelligent creature’s heart and soul.

 

Under the watchful eye of Bob, a stray dog and best bud, Ivan reluctantly
agrees to baby elephant Ruby's request that he tell her a story.

I’ve not been a fan of the increasingly convincing CGI talking animals in recent Disney films — particularly when they burst into song — because their speaking ability destroys the otherwise astonishing accuracy with which such critters are created. But it works here, because it is essential that we understand what motivates this saga’s star: what he imagines and yearns for, and how he reacts to the environment, people and other animals in his orbit.

 

Right from the start, it’s easy to embrace the fact that we’re sharing Ivan’s thoughts … which was, of course, the point of Applegate’s book. Considerable credit also goes to Sam Rockwell, who voices Ivan so sensitively; and director Thea Sharrock, who plays us like a fiddle. Let us not forget that Sharrock helmed 2016’s Me Before You, which had folks sobbing in the aisles.

 

Needless to say, this film — as was the case with Applegate’s book — also is a quietly powerful statement in our ongoing reassessment of wild animals in captivity. Indeed, the fact that this story is set in a circus, of sorts, feels uncomfortable. But it’s a period piece, faithful to the 1980s setting; more to the point, Sharrock and White don’t preach. 

 

Viewers have no trouble drawing the proper conclusions.

 

Events take place at the Exit 8 Big Top Shopping Mall and Video Arcade, which for years has boasted a “little top” circus. (Filming took place in Lakeland, Fla., although the script deliberately avoids specificity; this could be any indoor mall, in any city or state.) Ivan, the 400-lb. star, is joined by Stella (voiced by Angelina Jolie), an aging African elephant, and a small assortment of other critters.

 

The tiny circus was founded years earlier by Mack (Bryan Cranston), as a means to accommodate and earn a living with Ivan, who was rescued as a baby but quickly outgrew his initial suburban home. The two have long shared a special relationship.

 

In the tradition of such stories, Ivan, Stella and the other animals converse avidly with each other, but never with humans. It’s a testament to both Cranston and CGI wizardry, that we recognize the Mack/Ivan bond via silent expressions, forehead touches and other tiny — but powerful — shared gestures.