The movie of the summer—or the year, it may turn out—is a great treat for the female audience.

You may have stopped playing with Barbies when you were five. You may detest the unrealistic beauty ideal the iconic doll has promoted for decades with her anatomically impossible body. If so, you aren’t alone, and American writer-director Greta Gerwig has created a brilliant comedy you may just find wonderfully enjoyable.

The first time I watched Barbie, on July 20, the theatre was full of groups of women and mother/daughter duos that laughed throughout the movie. The second time I saw it, on July 25 with my women’s film club, the audience also included lots of men. Clearly, word had gotten out.

Here’s what you probably weren’t expecting from a movie seemingly shot entirely in various shades of pink: Barbie is a deliciously subversive film that shines a spotlight on regressive sex roles and offers a delightful vision of a world run by women. The trailer leads us to believe it’s a story about the American doll’s existential crisis, but in fact it takes on much more than one doll’s problems.

The woman behind the screenplay is 39-year-old Greta Gerwig, who has given us other enjoyable, empowering feminist films that have much to offer the female audience, namely her 2019 film adaptation of Little Women and her 2017 coming of age story, Lady Bird. Both star Saoirse Ronan and promote the advancement of women’s rights, as does this screenplay, which Gerwig co-wrote with her husband Noah Baumbach.

You wouldn’t expect this from Barbie, but Barbie the movie depicts women fighting patriarchy—it’s named many times—and successfully overthrowing it. One of the themes woven through the film, often through satire, is how women are kept down. And Barbie does it with a light touch. You can tell from the trailer that it won’t be like Thelma & Louise. (The icing on the cake is Helen Mirren’s ironic narration, that elicits much laughter from the audience.)

These reasons alone make Barbie incredibly unique in the Hollywood filmscape. What other big-budget Hollywood movie depicts women working together to overthrow patriarchy, making it look fun into the bargain?

In Barbieland, women run everything, the President and Supreme Court judges are all women. It’s ‘girls’ night’ every night. All the Barbies have their own house and live without Kens, who are just accessories playing supportive roles. How’s that for role reversal!

The story follows Stereotypical Barbie, played by 33-year-old Australian actress Margot Robbie, whose perfect existence in Barbieland with her friends is suddenly complicated by inexplicable changes in her life. For example, her heels fall to the ground, and she begins having thoughts about death. These changes indicate that she is malfunctioning. A more worldly Barbie named Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon) convinces Stereotypical Barbie to journey to Real World to find her girl owner. She believes the girl is sad and that somehow a portal has been opened, a rift Barbie must fix by helping the girl. So Barbie, who wants her blissful, perfect life back, leaves her beloved Barbieland in search of the girl—with Ken in the backseat of her car.

When they reach Real World (California), Ken—played by 42-year-old Canadian actor Ryan Gosling—learns about patriarchy. He is delighted that a world exists where men control everything and returns to Barbieland ahead of Barbie, inspired to transform it into a patriarchy, which he renames Kenland. He also turns Barbie’s house into a man cave and brainwashes all the Barbies into being subservient to the Kens (think 2004’s film adaptation of The Stepford Wives).

When Barbie returns home—with Mattel’s CEO (Will Ferrell) and executive board in pursuit to get her back in a box—having been saved by her girl owner Sasha (Ariana Greenblatt) and the girl’s mother Gloria (America Ferrera), she discovers Ken’s betrayal and becomes depressed. However, Gloria, Sasha, and Weird Barbie help her deprogram the brainwashed Barbies and return control of Barbieland to women.

What this enchanting movie bursting with whimsy has to offer female moviegoers is largely the opposite of what most Hollywood movies offer: a female protagonist; many significant female characters; congeniality, affection, solidarity, and many exchanges between females; a loving mother/daughter relationship; etc. Barbie tells Gloria and Sasha, “I love women. I want to help women.” This isn’t something the female audience often gets to hear at the theatre.

Barbie, produced by Mattel, Heyday Films, LuckyChap Entertainment and NB/GG Pictures, is full of love for women and appears to be inspired by a desire to improve women’s lives. It’s noteworthy that it has had the biggest opening weekend of 2023 (US$162 million) and in its first 12 days in theatres earned nearly double the box office receipts as Oppenheimer, released the same day (US$804 million vs US$430 million).

Grab a couple of women friends or your teenage daughter—it’s inappropriate for children under 13—and treat yourself to this very fun, joyful film. You wouldn’t expect it from Barbie, but it’s full of food for thought.

Barbie is rated PG-13 and has a running time of 114 minutes. It was released on July 21.

Alline Cormier
Film analyst

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