The influence of Barbie on the zeitgeist can’t be denied.
Enquiries for blonde hair are up 83%, and if you’re not wearing pink right now (pink branding has risen by 46%), are okay, hun?
But the film has also had a slightly unexpected impact on our love lives. It turns out that people are questioning their relationships – and even dumping partners – over their reaction to the film.
That’s right, a fun film about a doll is causing people to break up.
But how did a film about female empowerment that’s anti-patriarchy become a breakup movie?
Well, according to an onslaught of TikTok videos, the answer lies in the lack of men willing to ‘get’ the film.
In on video, Reina Dombrovska claims that ‘getting’ the Barbie film ‘should be a standard in a relationship.’
In the comments, one woman shared: ‘That’s why i broke up with him. He didn’t get it’.
Another TikTokker posted a video saying she ‘had to leave a cis man on read’, also because he ‘didn’t get it’, and others have called this a ‘deal breaker’.
It seems that what women want men to ‘get’, is that Barbie is anti-patriarchy – not anti-men. And though it’s a film primarily aimed at women, men shouldn’t view the film as an attack.
There’s clearly a gendered divide here, with some women reporting their boyfriends thought the film was ‘too political’, while others suggest ‘dumping him’ is the only solution.
It’s not just TikTok – women are discussing this on Twitter and Reddit too.
One woman posted on Reddit: ‘AITA [Am I The Ar*ehole] for telling my boyfriend that I’m rethinking our whole relationship because of the Barbie movie?’
Another wrote: ‘I’ve asked my boyfriend to go to the cinema with me, both dressed in pink. It would show that he supports me, and it’d just be fun.
‘He agreed to watch the movie with me, but not in pink. I told him wearing pink is minimum effort, he says minimum effort is him coming along to the movie.
‘AITA for finding this unreasonable? All my friend’s boyfriends did it, even my dad and brother would.’
And it’s going both ways – another woman wrote she was ‘broken up with because of my hyperfixation and excitement of the Barbie movie’.
Provider: Warner Bros
Jennifer Maytorena Taylor, a filmmaker and professor at the University of California specialising in film and feminism, believes this film is exposing ‘male fragility’.
‘It’s sadly predictable that Barbie has right wing conspiracists ginning up ridiculous stories about the film’s content,’ she says.
‘But beyond that, Barbie seems to have hit a broader nerve with men who feel threatened by the film’s brilliantly deft and truly funny critiques of patriarchy.
‘To me, if some men can’t handle one single movie that pretty gently tweaks the structures of male privilege through the story of a bunch of literal dolls, that’s an indication of how truly and deeply toxic masculinity is driven by male fragility.’
It seems that for many young women who feel their boyfriends are failing to understand this, alarm bells are ringing.
Provider: Warner Bros
There is a line to toe though, as Emma Kenny, a TV psychologist, explains that you can’t expect your partner to appreciate everything you do – especially if your views and experiences of the world are different.
She says: ‘While common values and interests are important in relationships, the idea that your partner doesn’t appreciate Barbie and it compromising your relationship, makes no sense whatsoever.
‘It’s like saying if you don’t watch the boxing together, the relationship is doomed to fail. Some women would enjoy watching that material, but many would say they’re disinterested.
‘It’s healthy to have disagreements and like different things – and you could be trying to cause unnecessary fractures in a partnership.’
Ultimately, ‘it’s about compatibility with a subject matter’, as she puts it, and this film is emulating differences between the genders. Most men, stereotypically, won’t be interested in dolls and pink – and the film won’t reflect their values.
So while some men who watch the film will react as this TikTokker wrote: ‘my bf cried with me and texted his mum saying he loves her’, others will struggle to get their boyfriend to be enthusiastic about attending.
The clincher, perhaps, is in whether they just can’t be bothered to watch Barbie, or they feel ‘threatened’ by its analysis of patriarchy, as Jennifer puts it. The latter might be grounds for dumping – or at least, a conversation.
And hey, if your boyfriend won’t go with you, take yourself or a friend – you’ll probably have a better time anyway.
As Jennifer quips: ‘Maybe they’re mad because Barbie gets a vagina in the ending and Ken still has no penis?’
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