Moms and Daughters Tell Us about their Barbie Experience

by Meghan Corridan, Occupational Therapist

Like many moms with teenage daughters, I jump at the chance to spend time with my daughter who is often too busy for me. When she recently asked me to join her and her best friend at the Barbie Movie last weekend, I seized the opportunity to share that experience with both girls. Loving the cast and Greta Gerwig, the director, as much as I do, also made it an easy decision to join them.

Initially, I thought I was heading into a silly kid’s movie that wasn’t going to have much of a plot. I was surprised when I was proven wrong. I didn’t expect The Barbie Movie to have such a powerful and meaningful effect on all three of us. While there were lots of laughs from the girls during the movie, it was the tears and the lunch conversation that really struck me.

As I spoke to other moms and read their reviews on social media platforms, it was clear that The Barbie Movie sparked a wide array of emotions with so many mothers and daughters around the country.

For me, the most profound message that the film left me with is that it is OK to just be you and that “being ordinary” is OK too. Ordinary need not be judged.

Like many women, I am constantly trying to live up to the standards that society has set – striving to be the perfect mother, wife, colleague, friend and so much more. My major take away from The Barbie Movie is that we should be the best version of ourselves that we can be, while also making ourselves happy and being true to ourselves.

Over the weekend, the Barbie Movie became the first solo female directed movie to surpass the $1 billion dollar mark in earnings. This was quite an accomplishment for Greta Gerwig.

I’ve interviewed and gotten feedback from adults and youngsters about the impact of this movie and why it resonated for them. Take a look at their responses below to my three questions:

1. What did you think The Barbie Movie was going to be about?

2. What surprised you the most about the movie?

3. What is something you took away from the movie?

Quinn, 13
Q1) Going into the movie I knew it would be about Barbie exploring the real world and I knew it was gonna contain some sort of deep message or meaning, I just didn’t know how beautiful and emotional it would be. I had high expectations going in and the movie still managed to blow me away.

Q2) One thing I would say surprised me about the Barbie movie was the impact it’s having on girls and people of all ages. Even before the movie came out, I knew it would reach many people but I didn’t know just how much it could change and impact us.

Q3) As a teen girl, I know there so much about us that men will never understand and so much that we go through everyday that they’ll never experience. After seeing Barbie, I’ve seen men making fun of everything and anything about the movie including the girls and women dressing up to go see it. Girls and woman all over are being harassed and bullied by men which just proves the exact point of the movie and goes to show that some people will never understand. The Barbie movie showed me just how beautiful girlhood and womanhood is. I left the theater with a deeper understanding of myself and all girls.

Julia, 17
Q1) I thought it was gonna be about the stereotypical Barbie and Ken love story.

Q2) It surprised me how funny and good it was.

Q3) It really made me appreciate my mom.

Lila, 14
Q1) I knew the movie was going to be about the realization of the real world, but I didn’t know it was going to be this deep.

Q2) It surprised me. I wasn’t expecting Ken to go into the real world and take all the things he learned and be basically brainwashed into this new way of life. It was interesting the way they did that.

Q3) I took away many things but most to value my childhood and to stop caring about how I look or the things I have because I’m not going to be young forever.

Kara, mother of Julia and Lila
Q1) What did I think it would be about? I had no idea. I didn't know if it was going to be live action or a regular movie, didn't know what the plot could even be. I did assume because of the director that it would make you think differently about Barbie and/or feminism.

Q2) Something that surprised me: The impact it had on my children. They don't have strong views on most social issues, and I would not describe them as feminists but this struck a chord with them. It was a combination of nostalgia (missing the innocence of young childhood) and the pressure they feel as girls/young women. It also made them reflect on how they interact with me--something I never would have predicted!

Q3) Something I took away from the movie: It was a good reminder that as a society we haven't made the progress for women that we say we have. And America Ferrera's monologue made me think harder about the lengths many of us go to be likeable. I want to challenge myself to not care as much about that in certain settings.

Reilly, 15
Q1) I thought the movie was going to be about Barbie deciding to leave Barbie Land only to discover that society is against women and about Barbie having to face like the brutal truth of what it’s like to be a woman in the real world

Q2) I knew it would be Barbie discovering misogyny in the real world but I didn’t expect Ken to bring it into Barbie Land with the patriarchy. I thought it was interesting though and a good example of how men have the ability to destroy what women work so hard for.

Q3) I think my biggest take away was that, as hard as it can be and as much as it can suck, there’s something so incredibly beautiful about being a woman. The ability to grow and discover yourself is something we should feel lucky for having, even when it’s not very fun. I also love the entire message being that as women we can have all that we work for taken away from us in seconds, but we have to fight for it. There’s no point in beating ourselves up, cause that’s what they want us to do. The way society treats us is not fair, it hasn’t been fair, and the patriarchy running our world doesn’t want to fix that, so we have to work for it ourselves and not give up when the people rooting against us tell us we’re not good enough, because we are good enough.

Nina, 13
Q1) I thought it was just gonna be about cute dolls living in Barbie Land and they get stuck in the real world with some basic plot.

Q2) I was surprised about how much meaning it actually had and how it portrayed growing up and girlhood perfectly.

Q3) For the most part I took away the fact that I’ll eventually grow up and go into the real world with responsibilities and not have everything handed to me as perfect as it seems, despite the fact it will be hard to do the things I want to achieve.

Liv, 13
Q1) I thought the movie was gonna be about Barbie finding her real mom if, she even has one and about Barbie getting closer with Ken.

Q2) Something that surprised me was the montage at the end of all those little kids with there mothers, because I just don’t now who those kids are.

Q3) Something I took away from the movie is moms really do care about there kids which goes in to how much there kids can affect them in many ways, good and bad at times depending how we are to them. But they truly always will love you and little things can make them very happy.”

Gioia (age 9)
Q1) I thought it was going to be about Barbie visiting the real world, but that's all I knew.

Q2) Something that surprised me is that I cried about seven times.

Q3) No more Ken dolls for me... I'm joking.

Jamie, mom of Gioia

Q1) I knew it was going to be about Barbie in the real world, but I imagined it being akin to The Brady Bunch Movie, which in some ways it was but it was much more profound than I thought it would be.

Q2) I was surprised by how overt the feminist messaging was and also how they managed to make overt feminist messaging funny and thoughtful without being annoying and preachy.

Q3) It sounds corny, perhaps, but it made me realize what a magical but delicate age my 9 year old daughter is right now. She had a really visceral reaction to the movie: she loved it but she was weepy the rest of the evening. She's young enough to still love playing with Barbies and stuffed animals but she's close enough to the teen stage where she knows it's coming and vaguely understands it means things are changing, but she doesn't quite grasp how yet. It sort of reminded me that the things a lot of us perhaps take for granted as "this is what it means to be a woman" isn't something we have to take for granted because it's artificial and learned. It's made me more mindful about how to approach these subjects with both my daughter AND my tween son.