Right like another beloved cool dude was Pat Morita, who also added a fauxcent for two of his most popular characters from Karate Kid and Happy Days
This reminds me of my favorite anecdote about Revenge of the Nerds. The 80s movie nerd archetype was essentially invented by the character actor Eddie Deezen (best known as Eugene from Grease although I favor his turn as Wesley in Midnight Madness). Revenge of the Nerds was basically a rip off of his lifeâs work. Nonetheless, when the production was announced he was quite excited as he though he finally had a legit shot in a leading role. Instead he was told that they wanted good looking guys to play nerds, not actual nerds.
Barbie is for sure the weirdest blockbuster ever made. If it wasnât for the IP it would be odd for a film fest movie.
I canât believe this got made and it making a zillion dollars.
Really seems like right place, right time is helping fuel Barbie mania. Perhaps we just didnât know how much latent love was out there for the ip.
1 Like
The IP must detract some people too. Itâs basically an ad for one of the worst body-shaming products of all time. If it wasnât for this thread I would never even consider watching it.
1 Like
I missed that one
One of the things that struck me most about that movie was how much he was a douchebag. Looked it up afterwards and it was relatively true about him (minus some condensing/changes for the screen)
I read a treasured take that Margot Robbie is a big reason the movie is doing so well.
Not because she is that amazing on her own, but because she has enough power now to have told the studio to let Greta Gerwig do what she wants and donât you dare cut x/y/z scene.
Before Greta and Margot were attached to the movie, it was going to star Amy Schumer. Mattel had a very different movie in mind. We were saved by a confluence of elements and people who helped us see a singular vision of Barbie.
When asked what happened on an episode of Bravoâs Watch What Happens, Schumer joked, âThey said I was too thin.â But she has since then opened up about what really happened.
Schumer told The Hollywood Reporter in 2022 that an incident involving a Jell-O shoe led to her exit.
âThey definitely didnât want to do it the way I wanted to do it, the only way I was interested in doing it,â she told the outlet, confirming that she wanted the character to be an âinventor,â but that the studio wanted her invention to be a shoe made out of the sweet treat. âThe idea that thatâs just what every woman must want, right there, I should have gone, âYouâve got the wrong gal.ââ
You donât need to look any further to how bad it would have been than to see what Mattel is doing in the wake of Barbieâs success.
Well, we are definitely experiencing that movies aimed at demographics that donât usually get as many movies aimed at them can do well.
Crazy Rich Asians exploded.
Weâve gone over how there arenât many big budget studio comedies anymore. Barbie is funnier than about any movie I can remember seeing for a while.
And obviously, when was the last time a group of women could all go to a movie together and be excited? Event movies are huge. That youâre not just going with your bf/gf, but grabbing 5 friends.
Iâd say there are weirder blockbusters still. People thought Titanic would bomb until it came out. It got a ton of bad press. Barbie had just an exhaustive, but ultimately amazing marketing campaign. Gosling and Robie sold the shit out of this movie.
2 Likes
So true. He popped up in Daisy Jones and The Six and I found myself wondering why the tour manager was going to get into a shoot out
1 Like
I feel like there was a moment in the film that sort of captured the contradiction.
Paraphrasing.
Barbie pitches something like âeveryday Barbieâ Will Farrell says something like âthatâs a terrible idea we arenât doing thatâ. Money guy behind him âItâs going to make us moneyâ Will Ferrell âI Like itâ!
Yeah, this. I knew this was going to be an epic success months ago. There is a huge underserved audience out there, Gerwig is cooking with some powerful ideas about nostalgia and coming of age. Robbie and Gosling have once-in-a-generation charisma and they both seem to have understood the assignment perfectly.
The best part is, the studios have no idea why this worked. Theyâre going to light unimaginable piles of money on fire trying to make cookie-cutter movies about Uno and American Doll and itâs going to be hilarious.
2 Likes
At this point, Greta Gerwig deserves eyes on everything she does until such time as she squanders that good will. Gerwig is certainly why I knew that it was likely to be a good movie, and Iâm not sure what I would have expected otherwise.
1 Like
Dial of Destiny is a good movie and deserves better than the reaction itâs getting; you would think that they went out and released Crystal Skull 2.0, and they absolutely did not. Itâs clearly better than Crystal Skull and Temple of Doom, which is the only reasonable expectations bar you could hold it to. The action sequences are a lot of fun and Phoebe Waller-Bridge is as delightful of an addition as you would expect.
Disclaimer: I feel like I wasnât as negative on Crystal Skull as others either, so perhaps Iâm out of step with how other people process these. Basically I thought Crystal Skull was a solid movie until its final act, when it melted into a pile of utter nonsense, making it overall not a very good movie, but still one that provided some fun before it collapsed. Thankfully with Dial of Destiny I have no real âbut this part was really badâ caveats to give as I assess it.
2 Likes
Thatâs whatâs so amazing about Hollywood. You think after a century of existing they wouldâve dialed in what makes a great movie and they still havenât.
Barbie was great.
1 Like
Barbie is just making bank on nostalgia.
On an intellectual level someone can understand why Barbie dolls may have been an objectively bad toy for young girls. But if you played with Barbie dolls as a kid and liked them, then you are gonna see this movie.
There is a lot of money to be made if you hit that nostalgia button just right and make people think of the happier days of their childhood.
1 Like
We dragged the entire family to Barbie, and somehow I was the only one who liked it. I thought it was great, and Iâm glad I saw it in the theater. There were several times where I was like, I think Iâm enjoying this but Iâm not entirely sure why. That was helped by a really energetic audienceâIâm not sure I would have enjoyed it nearly as much at home on my TV.
Advance lol at whatever ip-inspired garbage Mattel is going to try to follow this up with.
1 Like
This is not true. If WB went through with the Amy Schumer version that was in production, it would have been the biggest bomb of the year.
2 Likes
Agree. This was not a guaranteed success by any means. They put the right people on it and marketed really effectively. Obviously helpful also that the movie is good, keeping the positive momentum going on word of mouth. Not at all difficult to imagine a world in which a Barbie movie was just a huge money-losing joke.
2 Likes