Joey Magidson
Yesterday, the day finally arrived!. July 21st…Barbenheimer day. Greta Gerwig‘s Barbie and Christopher Nolan‘s Oppenheimer are now in theaters, with social media having crafted a double feature to mark the occasion. Never one to miss an opportunity for an Awards Radar Community Question, we’re asking for your takes on this pop culture event.
If you took in both films, you can either tell us what you thought of Barbie and Oppenheimer, or you can just tell us your feelings on Barbenheimer in general. You know how I feel about those titles, but now is the time to put forth your takes.
On the other hand, if you only saw one, let us know why. Are you all in on Barbie? Maybe you’re just a big Nolan fan? Whichever the movie you were only into, that’s cool, but let us know why you didn’t go in for Barbenheimer. Not a fan of peer pressure? We salute you, but you missed out on an all-timer of a double feature.
As a refresher, my Barbie rave review is here and began like so:
A Barbie movie probably shouldn’t even exist, let alone be this good. An audacious start to this review, I know, but this is an audacious film. Taking a doll and giving it life, while examining both the positives and negatives of its very existence, through the lens of a laugh out loud yet often touching comedy? This is damn near a miracle of a movie. Skewering the societal patriarchy while also having you howl at cinematic references, epic dance numbers, and genuine emotion? Greta Gerwig has outdone herself here. This is one of the year’s best works so far.
Considering that the log line for this flick is simply that “Barbie suffers a crisis that leads her to question her world and her existence,” there’s a ton going on here. Barbie is action, comedy, fantasy, and satire all rolled into one, with immersive production design, its tongue planted firmly in its cheek, but its heart always beating loudly and proudly. I know I’m not necessarily the audience for this film (aside from loving quality cinema), but knowing that there are young girls out there that will see this and absolutely go gaga over it, that heartens me to no end. Plus, as mentioned, it’s just spectacular entertainment.
Here is my Oppenheimer raves as well, and it began in this fashion:
When you think of Christopher Nolan, you don’t think of activism or character studies. With Oppenheimer, he’s putting forth an epic version of both. In crafting a biopic of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the nuclear bomb, Nolan has opted to make this a tale of not just one of the 20th century’s most important men, but a missive that nuclear warfare will eventually doom us all, much like the weapon’s development ultimately doomed the man himself. It’s as much a thriller as a drama, albeit with the filmmaker’s typical flair. If he was ever going to do his JFK, this is it. It’s also a riveting experience and one of the best things I’ve seen all year.
Oppenheimer is an epic character study as well as a dire warning. This engrossing experience builds to an endgame that places no less than the fate of humanity almost at death’s door. It’s heady stuff for summer cinema, but in Nolan’s hands, the urgency is never ignored, but the riveting nature of it makes for one of is most unique works to date. Frankly, given the choice between more work like this and more explorations of the action genre, I’ll take ten more Oppenheimer types before he goes back to Tenet. We’ve seen him master action. Now, he’s mastered the biopic and character study.
Now, it’s time for you to chime in. If you did the Barbenheimer double feature, report back on your findings. If you only saw one of the flicks, still let us know what you thought. We’re all ears, so don’t be shy…
Did you do the Barbenheimer double feature? If so, let us know your thoughts!
It feels “wrong” for me, of all people, to have preferred Christopher Nolan‘s formally ambitious three-hour historical biopic about men playing god to Greta Gerwig‘s conceptually ambitious metanarrative about modern womanhood through the prism of an iconic toy line, but… I think I did. If I “had to” list them, I could point out a bunch of little problems I had with Oppenheimer that ultimately don’t detract from delivering on where it absolutely mattered most – namely Cillian Murphy‘s performance, the Trinity Test, and the finale, which were all perfectly-executed. Whereas I felt Barbie had fewer individual problems… but they’re “bigger” problems, if that makes sense?
God, what’s next? Am I gonna be a guest on the Joe Rogan Experience?
It happens to the best of us!