Suzanne Harrington: The Barbie movie is a reclamation of a girlhood icon

Ryan Gosling as Ken and Margot Robbie as Barbie, in the latter's recent film excursion.

As the credits rolled at the end of the Barbie movie recently — because it’s definitely a movie rather than a film — two small boys leapt from their seats a few rows ahead, their excitement spilling over. 

“That was better than Shrek!” one of them shouted. “Yeah!” shouted the other. “Wasn’t it Dad!” You could see a pink-bathed silhouette of the dad nodding, as the audience streamed out of the cinema, high on toffee popcorn and Barbie power.

And yet there have been some people — right-wing people, mostly but not exclusively in possession of testicles — who have been triggered. Triggered! Yes, triggered by Barbie. 

Who have fired all the -isms at it — feminism, liberalism, communism. Republican senator Ted Cruz actually called the movie Chinese communist propaganda without having seen it. Made by that well-known Chinese communist outfit, Mattel.

Another Republican senator, Matt Gaetz, who has the hots for Margot Robbie, took a more splatter-gun approach when he said, “If you let the trans stop you from seeing Margo [sic] Robbie…the terrorists win.” 

Which (a) is like pouring slime all over Robbie, (b) denigrates one of the other Barbies, trans actor Hari Nef, and, (c) leaves terrorists everywhere scratching their heads. Never mind. 

These are the kind of people who use words like ‘woke’ and ‘antifa’ as insults, without considering what the opposite of these words actually are: not awake, and fascist. It’s almost as if they don’t know what they’re talking about.

Suzanne Harrington. Picture: Denis Scannell

But beyond this tragic, desperate right-wing backlash against Greta Gerwig’s big pink movie is something rather more insidious, something more under the radar. 

Which is this: imagine going to an adult man’s house, and finding it full of, say, Star Wars toys, models, kits, and figurines. 

These toys would be called memorabilia, or collectibles, and would be regarded as a perfectly valid and acceptable hobby. 

The toys — sorry, collectibles — might be on shelves, or in more extreme cases (think Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons) still hermetically sealed in their original box, to be touched only by a gloved hand.

Now imagine going to an adult woman’s house, and finding it full of Barbies. On shelves, in display cases, maybe still in boxes. 

Unless you are a professional trader of dolls, this would not be regarded as a valid or acceptable hobby. 

It would be deemed weird, creepy, Baby Jane-ish. A bit horror movie. You’d dive out the nearest window, then turn it into a funny anecdote about the bunny boiler with the houseful of Barbies. Or Sindys.

Adult men are allowed to retain their childhood totems. Middle-aged Bart Simpsons on skateboards are cool, just as middle-aged BMXers are cool. 

Do middle-aged women tear around on Barbie scooters? No. We’d be shamed, ridiculed. We are expected to let go of childhood things, to grow up so that we can begin the labour of looking after everyone else. 

So Barbie is not just a feminist movie, but has created a tsunami of childhood nostalgia for women, a reclaiming of girlhood icons. This, in itself, is radical.