The Writers Take 12: Enter Barbenheimer!
Glitter, Fire, girl power
It’s finally time, The Writers Take with the most glitter, fire, girl power and um more firepower to ever exist (and probably to ever exist) is here.
It is time for Barbenheimer!
It's been weeks, and weeks, maybe even a month since I announced I would embark on this daring post, which aligns with the amount of time I had to wait to see Oppenheimer in the way Christopher intended for, in 70mm & IMAX.
But before I get to the Communist-loving Marxist, (kidding - intellectual curiosity is what is missing from our failing society). Just because you want to learn about something doesn't mean you support it. A simple yet maddening concept it seems for us Americans. We have to get into the Patriarchy world dividing, pink exploding extravaganza that is Barbie.
In a world in which men mask equality through high praise and inclusionary ideas, a group of women imagined a better way to live. Oh, I wasn’t talking about Barbie Land, not yet at least (hehe). So here we are, in a real world madhouse of opinions about a movie that, at its core, is about women empowerment, laughs, and honoring a legacy of dolls that transcends time and space.
Science. Science got their movie. After the disaster that was Gravity (oh you don’t know about this science apocalypse? Ok fine, A Writer's Take is coming on that!) Science has taken its lumps on the silver screen. Now you might say, “but Matt, Gravity isn’t Chris Nolan, at least comment on Interstellar…” Well, well, well, perhaps that's for another take, but I will say, while the science was fantastic in Interstellar, the risks were lame. Don’t get me wrong, I ADORE Interstellar. It is a seminal movie for science geeks like me. I’ve seen it perhaps a dozen times, but the main alien world you go to is a tidal wave planet? Really? That’s the best you could do? Come on Chris… ugh, but I digress…
Ok, so now we are here, 10 years after we entered the Tesseract and 5 years after we all said “WTF” was that to Tenet, (yeah… I’m not even going to get into that). All I’ll say is even Nolan is allowed a Mulligan. So what will we get with Oppenheimer? Would we get Momento? Or Dark Knight? Or would we get Tenet (oh god, please no).
Now, before I go any further than these 700 some odd words you’ve already endured, I must warn you since both Barbie and Oppenheimer are still in the theater there are MAJOR spoilers ahead…
Ok you’ve been warned.
Spoiler Number One!!!! Oppy drops the nuke! Ok ok ok, I guess you knew that, and if you didn’t, may god have mercy on your soul. But the question at hand is really, HOW do we get to that moment? How would Chris bring us to August 6th, 1945? To my surprise, he didn’t do it by spending the entire movie on building the bomb or on the unfortunate fall out after the bomb was dropped and the witch hunt that ensued. Instead, Chris, the master that he is, took us on a journey with Robert J. Oppenheimer, a journey of his life, his ideas, his faults, and his superior mind.
He took us on a journey of what it means to be a scientist.
Cue in the heavenly bells and the confetti! He did it, he really did it! He gave us all a front row ticket to understand why science is so loved by those who surround themselves with it and why it’s so feared by those who do it. One of my favorite lines in the film: “One's intellectual curiosity does not insinuate endorsement, it is simply curiosity.” Now, while that might be paraphrased, that was the sentiment of Oppy when confronted about his attendance to communist gatherings in the late 1930s/early 1940s. But it is a sentiment that has been washed away in recent years, a sentiment that needs to find its rebirth. That debate and conversation matched with intellectual curiosity and exploration of the mind are the only ways we can understand each other, and hope to have a unified society. We should never forget that.
Ok, so what about the elephant in the room? No not the marketing campaign with Barbie - WE
WILL GET TO THAT, Jesus, have some respect for plutonium! The elephant in THIS room is the infamous fact that Oppy wasn’t a strong mathematician. He was a theoretical scientist, an ideas guy. How on earth would he build a mathematical bomb? Because make no mistake - to split an atom surrounded by a ShBLEEEPt ton of TNT, you need a lot of math.
Simple. You build a town, and you populate it with not America’s best scientists, but the world’s. And you don’t just gloss over it, you humanize it with marbles, and conversations, and elegant dialog such as:
It's not a new weapon. It's a new world.
God doesn't play dice.
They won't fear it until they understand it. And they won't understand it until they use it.
Amateurs chase the sun and get burned... power stays in the shadows.
Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.
And so on and so forth. If fantastic dialog isn’t your cup of tea, then perhaps placing these fantastic characters into unfortunate situations… Whether it was the horseback riding into a full blown panic attack, only to be pulled out of it by the victim (fantastic acting by Emily Blunt) or when you put Oppy in a position where he knew Strauss was trying to take him down and he wouldn't do anything about it. These situations and more, provided an uncanny feeling of realism into the movements of the time.
With the incompatible performance by Matt Damon as the military general, “So there is a chance we blow up the world” speech with the scientists - so that you don’t just have science jargon spewing back and forth, but you force the scientists to contextualize the ideas in simple terms for the grunts (military slang, look it up if you don’t know it, hehe) making it digestible for the average movie goer.
But it wasn’t just about the building, it was about believing it was possible. And no one embodied that idea more than Matt Damon’s character Leslie Groves, a Lieutenant General, who, if Oppy was the bullet that pierced the veil of science, Lieutenant General Groves was the trigger man. An army guy through and through, with an engineering background, knew that the war would not be won by traditional means (ok, I know using the word, won, is contentious if you actually review history, but come on, let's not go there for this piece), no we would need extraordinary efforts to secure the fate of the world.
So that's just what Oppy did. And that's what we saw, we saw a man, who was driven not by greed or prestige but by science, an underlying URGE to discover a piece of science he knew existed but hadn’t been realized yet. That human emotion of need or desire is what makes this film so engaging. Whether we are all science nerds or not, lovers of world history or not, fans of the Manhattan project or not, we could relate to Robert Oppenheimer’s need to know if he could discover the one thing he felt in his bones was real. THAT human emotion is why Christopher Nolan is a genius.
I can go on and on, AND ON about the magic of Oppenheimer, and the interesting choices with Florence Pugh - the sex scene felt forced. While interesting and provocative, there was not enough set up to make it as impactful as I thought it could have been.
But enough is enough, and we all know sex sells, so you have to find ways to sell a nerdy science film. But you know what else sells? PINK. PINK F***ing sells. So without further adieu let's get to the Barb(ie) of Barbenheimer.
Dolls, Blondes, patriarchy and Ken. Oh Ken. Barbie had it all, and did it smartly. As nuanced and grand as Oppenheimer was, Greta Gerwig was as witty and grand for her rendition of a NON PG adaptation of the timeless doll that made every girl imagine what life could be like as an adult.
So, I’m not going to get into the politics of the movie, the critics using this as a way to attack people for this view or that view. I am strictly sticking to the intention and delivery of Greta and Margo’s vision. AND Ryan Gosling's Best Supporting Actor performance. So why was Barbie so good? Make no mistake, I thought it was fantastic. One of, if not THE best adapted from a toy, film or TV show ever made.
Others to consider
PAW PATROL
Swamp Thing
Toy Story (I know spicy)
Clue
Transformers
TMNT
Ok, ok ok, you get the point.
But again, the question is posed, WHY?
Well, Barbie did, what I consider to be the boldest move in cinema history. It made a movie for the fans of the golden age of the toy. Not for kids today, but for kids of the 80’s and 90’s who built Barbie into the juggernaut that it is. The kids who are adults now, and feel nostalgic when they hear the name, not kids of today who only know it because of those same adults who are parents now.
But it's not just about the demographic it was designed for, it is the witty sensibility, the no nonsense understanding of WHAT it is. The set designs and the acting nuance, from Margot, who was sensational, to Will Farrell who was absurd, and everyone in between. They knew what the mission was and executed accordingly. I left the theater with hope, with an understanding of female culture, the issues we still have at hand in society today and the feelings the other sex has towards how society has evolved while laughing my ass off and eating consumer goods like popcorn.
Isn't that what movie going is all about? Aren’t we going to the theaters to learn something we didn't fully understand, while laughing and going on a ride?
ISN'T THAT WHAT NICOLE KIDMAN TELLS US TO DO IN THE THEATER!?!?
But seriously, the musical number in the first act, the “Beach Off,” the horses and beer, Greta understood how to weave pop culture, timeliness and heartfelt storytelling together like the lady of the light (yup, I did it! Lord of The Rings reference here that works).
The best part of Barbie to me though, was of course, Weird Barbie. Kate McKinnon was down right hysterical and I don’t know if they are pushing for a best supporting actress bid, but they should if they are not. Her nuanced approach to the character added a level of humor the film benefited greatly from.
Ok fine, Alan and Simu Ken were hilarious too.
It’s finally time for our Third Act, the Barbehiemer Marketing campaign.
What can I say, you, two negatives equal a positive in science, but you know what else is true? Opposites attract. And just like that, an idea was birthed. Not the idea of splitting the atom, or the blonde haired blue eyed doll that swept the world. No, an idea even grander than those. The idea to combine them! And thus, BARBENHEIMER was born!
What is BARBENHEIMER? It is the cross-promotional juggernaut that swept a nation. Combine the most serious film with the most light-hearted and have the creators and leads swap tickets, and promote each other's film, to create a buzz unlike anything this nation has seen in decades. Executed flawlessly, this promotional tactic elevated both films from Summer Blockbusters to consequential films of our time.
Now why did this work? It’s actually quite simple to understand. When two things that have no relation to each other recognize greatness in the other, the connective tissue that it ignites is unlike anything else the human condition can experience. That is the magic of the BARBENHEIMER campaign. Not that it promotes one or the other, or that it is designed to make you love both, it is simply designed to have great recognize great movies that are not competitive and THAT makes everyone love the feeling. In a world where everyone is a pariah, kindness and enthusiasm pervials.
One of the core reasons this post has been delayed is because of an extremely special project that is close to my heart.
This week I released my comic book with Bobby Wagner, the NFL, Seattle Seahawks and Virginia Mason Franciscan Health to help educate communities on Stroke and how to recognize one and act on it, or simply put, how to READ & REACT, to the situation at hand. This book is a labor of love and a project that is near and dear to my heart.
Please watch Bobby talk about it here:
Read the Comic & Watch the motion comic here!!! http://vmfh.org/seahawks
And Join the team here! https://connect.virginiamasonfoundation.org/Phenia-Mae-Fund
READ. WATCH. DONATE.
Never stop dreaming, and always keep writing.
Matthew.