Collections Manager Aly Wepplo recommends the film, Barbie, from Warner Bros. Pictures.
This holiday season, I want to recommend the Barbie movie. Maybe you haven’t seen it yet. Maybe you got it the day it came out and have watched it every day since. Either way, or any way in between, you can check out Barbie from The Community Library.
Barbie celebrates the magic of play. It opens with a funny, moving scene of kids playing with dolls before Barbie. These dolls were something to care for, to feed and change and parent. And then…
Barbie changed everything. Kids stood in Barbie’s shoes, and they imagined what they could be – a veterinarian, a big sister, an astronaut…
Barbie gave kids confidence and ambition to reach for their dreams.
Barbie speaks to adults’ dreams, too. In the movie, America Ferrera (of TV’s Superstore) plays a mom who grew up with Barbie and longs for the sense of possibility it once gave her. She begins sketching ideas for the Barbie hero she needs now, and Barbie Land and the “real” world collide.
The supporting characters in this story are wonderful. I loved Kate McKinnon as Weird Barbie, whose playmates cut her hair and drew on her face. Weird Barbie embraces being different, and her unique thinking helps save the day.
Costume designer Ann Roth makes a cameo as an older woman Barbie meets at a real-world bus stop. Barbie tells her she’s beautiful, and the woman replies…
…“I know it!”
I hope your holiday season is full of gifting and playing and spending time together. I will watch this movie with my family and fondly remember my toys and the time I spent with them. I will marvel at the whimsy and color of Barbie Land realized on screen.
And then maybe I’ll watch it again.
