Barbie (4/5 Stars)

“There is only one thing worse in life than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

- Oscar Wilde

Barbie is a movie that is full of ideas. Don’t be distracted by all the pink, Ryan Gosling’s biceps, or Margot Robbie’s plastic smile. A definite feature of the movie is an exploration of what the doll means, to society, to consumerism, to the little girls that play with the dolls. Barbie’s baggage is as extensive as her wardrobe. And the creators, writer/director Greta Gerwig and co-writer Noah Baumbach are dealing with it head-on and with great comedic effect.

There is money to be made in taking an existing trademark and making a movie out of it. The Transformers movies are the most profitable example I guess. But, the gold standard, for me at least, is The Lego Movie, which was action packed and funny but also had a clear sense of what made playing with the toy a worthwhile experience. This was beautifully articulated in a perfect ending scene by the boy’s father (played by Will Ferrell) who had lost the original point of the toy by supergluing his perfect creations so that they could never again be taken apart. 

Barbie doesn’t have such a clear vision of what makes the toy work, but then again, Barbie is means many things to many people. The movie, with cleverness and humor, presents both sides: that Barbie is an icon of feminism, out there in the workforce doing very smart and prestigious jobs like President and Scientist. And then the other side: that Barbie is an icon of tyranny, that she has an unattainable physical beauty that depresses the young girls who play with her and make them feel terrible about themselves. Many think pieces have been penned about this. I remember seeing a Simpsons episode about it when I was very young.

What is missing from all these philosophical musings is what is closer to the actual truth. That Barbie doesn’t have much of an effect either way and for that reason it shouldn’t be controversial. However, this is the last argument the Mattel corporation would ever use in its defense. Like Hollywood’s weird obsequiousness to critics of diversity representation, they would rather be a bad guy than admit that they are unimportant. And the same goes for the big speech about society’s expectations for women in this movie. The only thing worse about society having unrealistic expectations is the awful truth: that no one really cares. The thing that makes Barbie such a hot topic is its interaction with women’s vanity. Women can complain all they want about having to do so much to keep up appearances, but so much of why they are so high in the first place is because women are competing with each other. In other words, it is women that are setting such high expectations. All one has to do from letting Barbie get one down is to be less shallow. 

I’m skipping much of the plot which for the most part doesn’t make much sense. Actually, this movie is quite good at doing just enough to keep the plot going and not worrying too much about whether it is doing enough. Sometimes, the lack of a coherent explanation forms the basis of a knowing joke. I mean, how much does it matter how one gets from Barbieland to the Santa Monica boardwalk? This movie would prove that it doesn’t matter all that much at all and makes a pretty good joke out of how illogical it is. In any event, the plot is this: Everything is perfect in Barbieland until the girl playing with Barbie in the real world starts making her doll go about doing depressing things. This provokes an existential crisis to Barbie, who then takes a trip to the real world and delves into philosophical musings about her purpose and yada yada yada. At the same time, Ken also takes a trip to the real world and, in doing so, he discovers patriarchy (power and horses) and a purpose other than beach. He brings it back to Barbieland and transforms Barbie's Dreamhouse into the Mojo Dojo Casa House (coming soon to a fraternity near you).

For most of this I was wishing Greta Gerwig had expended her considerable talents on a more personal type of movie like her first exceptional ones, Lady Bird and Little Women. I was at least comforted by the fact that she was getting paid and perhaps, like Christopher Nolan and other directors, would have more of an opportunity to make personal movies because she was a good sport that did some big budget movies as well. (In this scenario, Barbie is Greta’s Batman). That is, until I witnessed the Great Ken Beach Battle and Musical Number. That sequence won me over and is one of the best things I’ve seen in the movies in 2023. Ryan Gosling has been nominated for an Oscar for his performance in this movie. That is no mistake. The man is committed.

Overall, Barbie is a lot of fun, which is the right attitude to have towards the doll in general. I mean, come on, it’s a toy. Noone is actually asking women to look like her. Certainly not Ruth Handler, the creator of Barbie, who is portrayed here by Rhea Perlman, a very not-barbie like woman. Sometimes it’s just nice to have an excuse to wear bright pink. 

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (3/5 Stars)

 

When I penned a review of the “The Guardians of the Galaxy” in 2014, I wrote that within the first scene, I knew I was watching something new, something interesting, and something fun. The Marvel Universe had before that time stumbled into a run of too-serious melodramatic CGI slug-fests (the nadir being Thor: the Dark World), but here came Director James Gunn to liven things up a bit. It would lead to a string of great Marvel movies between 2014-2018. But greatness cannot last, and lately we have seen Marvel hit run of melodramatic CGI slugfests. The problems are not the same. In the first nadir, Marvel was having trouble making some of its very old characters like Thor, Hulk, and Captain America new and fresh. But they got around this by turning Hulk and Thor into comedians and introducing more facets to the personality of Captain America that weren’t so conformist (I’m still Team Iron Man by the way).

This second nadir involves Marvel’s attempt to branch out past the core fans of comic books by introducing more diverse and gendered super heroes. The problem is not that Marvel has superheroes with these types of identities, the problem is that these superheroes are not interesting. Captain Marvel, Black Panther, and now Shang-Chi all have a “Thor” problem. Polka-Dot Man from “The Suicide Squad” is a more interesting character than these three.

Shang-Chi in particular is just too safe of a character. He is a played by Simu Liu who would otherwise be a perfect casting choice for a mannequin. He is tall, broad-shouldered, and devoid of personality. Imagine instead that Marvel had cast Randall Park. Yes, I know that Randall Park is already a recurring character in Marvel’s Ant-Man and is Korean, not Chinese. I’m just saying imagine this character as someone interesting. Shang-Chi emigrated to San Francisco with his motion has a child and now goes by the name Shawn. Shawn lives alone in an apartment that is not really expensive, but still pretty good digs for a single guy in San Francisco. He works as a chauffeur with his best friend Katy (played by Awkwafina). So you know that he’s not privileged, but then Awkwafina quips that she graduated with honors at Berkeley and Shang-Chi knows four languages, so they clearly aren’t disadvantaged either. He’s just right there in the middle, not offending anybody.

One day while riding the bus, Shawn is attacked by a bunch of goons sent by his still-alive and very powerful gangster of a father Xu Wenwu (played by Tony Leung). A martial arts fight ensues and it turns out that Shawn knows Kung Fu (and that Katy can drive a bus under pressure). The action in this movie makes one nostalgia for prime Jackie Chan movies. They take place in impractical locales that Jackie would have used like on a bus, or in the bamboo scaffolding of a building, but the action in Shang Chi is just so computerized. It lacks the visceral qualities of a Jackie Chan film. So by directing the cinephiles attention to these past great action movies, one is rewarded by nostalgia, but also the distinct impression that they are watching something inferior. I wonder if it is even possible to make a Jackie Chan film like the ones he made in the 1980-90s. Perhaps it is just too dangerous. In any event, the computer scientists have yet to be able to perfect an equal alternative in quality.

Shawn and Katy discover that the father thought dead by Shawn is hatching an evil conspiracy and travel to Hong Kong to find Shawn’s sister and warn her. Instead, Shawn’s sister Xia Ling (played by Meng’er Zhang) finds him and reveals herself to be the head of a brutal gambling syndicate that hosts deadly fights in a Shanghai skyscraper. When asked how she came to be so powerful and influential she replies that her father would not allow her to be a part of his club, so when she decided at 16 years of age to run away and make her own. Fast forward ten years and here she is. There are no follow up questions. It is the sort of backstory only Ayn Rand would find believable.

It is further revealed that Shawn’s father is searching for an extradimensional village called Lu’an, which guards the prison of an ancient and evil dragon that would Consume The World if released. We see this village, it is hidden in a bamboo forest and contains large Chinese dream beasts and a water dragon. It reminds one of Wakanda but does not measure up to the experience. For one thing, Black Panther was the first time any corporation spent hundreds of millions of dollars making an African Xanadu. In China, a movie that with the budget and scope of Shang-Chi comes out every month. In 2004, I saw Jet Li’s “Hero” in an American movie theater. That’s a bigger and better movie than Shang-Chi so don’t give me the marketing pitch that Shang-Chi represents the coming out of Asian cinema. It’s only the first Marvel movie with an Asian main character. That distinction is not an important one. Asians have been producing great and influential movies since Japanese cinema came into its own in the 1950s. I have plenty of recommendations if you want them.

There are bright parts to this movie. For one thing, everything Awkwafina does is funny. At another point, Ben Kingsley reprises his actor character from “Iron Man 3” and he too is consistently funny. Here’s a novel idea. How about making the Shang-Chi sequel about Awkwafina and calling it “Katy with the No Powers”. It could be about her and Ben Kingsley’s efforts to sell a screenplay based on their adventures in this movie and then attempting to remake this movie with no budget. (I bet the no-budget car chases would be better than the ones in this movie). That fake movie could also have a great subplot about Katy’s efforts to kow-tow to the strictrues of the Communist Party of China in order to get the movie a release inside the country. Katy could be like “this is funny,” and CCP would be like “too funny,” and “this is interesting,” and CCP like “too interesting,” and then this is something, and then CCP like “make it nothing”. At the end Katy could come to the realization that communists won’t be okay with anything because they would rather people not say or think anything other than what they tell them to.

I’m throwing shade. It is Marvel that should come to this realization. This year they might. They have gone to great lengths to present China and the Chinese in the least controversial most boring light possible. For all their efforts, CCP still won’t allow “Shang-Chi” to be released in the country. CCP has also made it clear that the next Marvel movie “The Eternals” will not be released because it is helmed by Oscar Winning Director Chloe Zhang. Marvel must have thought it would have been a plus with CCP to hire a Chinese-American Director like Ms. Zhang for one of their movies. But no, Ms. Zhang once had an opinion about China, calling it a “place of lies” and CCP decided that it was insulting to China and the Chinese for anyone, and perhaps especially a Chinese person, to point out all of CCP’s lies. This may be a good thing. Perhaps Marvel with stop positioning for the approval of a totalitarian government and, as a result, make better movies.