It’s kinda weird for a film to have such a rabid cult following well before it’s ever seen. But such was the case for “Barbie”, the new film from director Greta Gerwig based on the popular Mattel fashion dolls which first launched way back in 1959. Many of the film’s passionate fans were brought onboard by the wild social media hype. Others were drawn in by the intense marketing campaign that saw Barbie slapped on everything from a Prada clothing line to a limited-edition Burger King cheeseburger. It was a buzz that went beyond mere anticipation.

The eye-catching “Barbie” trailers stoked even more excitement. Suddenly memes were being generated by the gross. Google was turning its search pages pink, Xbox designed a Barbie inspired gaming console, Airbnb was listing a real-life Barbie Malibu Dream House. It was all pretty crazy. So in many ways “Barbie” was conditioned to succeed well before anyone had laid eyes on it. And any reasonable hesitations were mostly swept away in the sea of pink, plastic, and product.

It all translated into a record-breaking opening weekend for Gerwig and Warner Brothers. In one sense it was great to see. I’m a long-time fan of Gerwig and her work so it’s good to see her star deservingly rise. In another sense it’s a little sad to see her moving to mainstream studio blockbusters. It will inevitably take a bite out of her terrific independent filmmaking. And what does it mean for Greta Gerwig the actress? She’s such a delight on screen and it’s reasonable to expect that we’ll see her in even fewer acting roles.

“Barbie” (co-written by Gerwig and her longtime partner in life and in movies, Noah Baumbach) is quite the shift for the director whose two previous efforts were “Lady Bird” and “Little Women”. If you strain you can catch glimpses of the Greta Gerwig who more than earned her stripes through years of great work on the indie scene. But just as much of the film seems aimed at satisfying the expectations of fans and (I’m sure to some degree) the demands of Mattel and WB executives. It leaves “Barbie” feeling like a weird amalgamation of indie ideas and studio pomp.

Part satire, part deconstruction, part heavy-handed manifesto, “Barbie” wears its worldview on its sleeve. Patriarchy is clearly its favorite target with some of its shots being genuinely clever and funny while others are so overt and on-the-nose that you could almost spoon-feed them to 7-year-olds. You won’t find an ounce of subtlety or nuance in the movie’s commentary nor is it presented in a way that will actually challenge our sociocultural systems. It’s also undermined by one nagging contradiction that I won’t spoil.

The film’s biggest strength is Margot Robbie who may seem like the obvious choice to play Barbie, but who brings some unexpected weight and depth to the character through her knock-out performance. We first meet her in the pastel and plastic Barbieland, a matriarchal society where all the Barbies run things and go by the same names. There’s President Barbie (Issa Rae), Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon), Writer Barbie (Alexandra Shipp), Physicist Barbie (Emma Mackey), Doctor Barbie (Hari Nef), and so on (Robbie’s Barbie is referred to as Stereotypical Barbie for reasons that Gerwig makes impossible to miss).

Meanwhile the Kens hang out by the beach where Ryan Gosling’s version seeks to impress Robbie’s Barbie whenever she comes around. It quickly becomes evident that he’s smitten with her but she clearly doesn’t feel the same way. Other Ken versions are played by Simu Liu, Kingsley Ben-Adair, Scott Evans, Ncuti Gatwa, and others. We even get John Cena in a pretty cringy cameo.

The opening act is easily the film’s best as Gerwig has a blast playing around in Barbieland, introducing the Barbies and Kens, and having a lot of fun with the silly dynamics between them all. But things change after Robbie’s Barbie (who I’ll just call Barbie for the remainder of the review) begins having thoughts of mortality, discovers she has cellulite, and worst of all is suddenly flat-footed.

Barbie learns the only way to return things to normal is to travel to the real-word and find the little girl who is playing with her. So Barbie sets off in her pink Corvette convertible only to later find Ken stowed away in the backseat. She reluctantly allows him to tag along on her journey. By the way, it’s best not to try and make sense out of any of this. The movie certainly doesn’t. How Barbieland and the real-world connect; how children in the real-world effect dolls in Barbieland – from the movie’s POV who knows and who cares.

One problem with putting so much effort into hammering home its message is that the film shortchanges other parts of the story. While it packs a few laughs, the entire real-world segment feels rushed and frankly quite shallow. The biggest casualties are Gloria (America Ferrera) and her tween-ish daughter Sasha (Ariana Greenblatt). Gloria works at Mattel and only seems there to deliver a big attention-drawing second-half monologue. Sasha is rebelling against pretty much everything although we never really know why. Their troubled mother/daughter relationship should have been a key part of the story. Instead it comes across as a paper-thin side note.

By the time the movie returns to Barbieland for its third act the gags start to get old and some of the swings at humor feel a little forced. Still the film manages to land on a pretty solid note – a bit contrived but sweet and smile-inducing. It’s the road to that point that has its potholes. There are enough cool references to make little girls smile but enough sexual innuendo and double entendres to make parents squirm. The set design is incredible but gets lost in the second half’s noise. The theme of breaking out of boxes and finding our true selves is a great one but is drowned out by the movie’s more singleminded interest.

It’s 100% aware that I’m not the target audience and much of “Barbie” could have flown right over my head. I kinda doubt it though. I’m a huge Gerwig fan. I liked the nostalgic callbacks and the many spoofs. I like its cornball sense of humor (which is right up my alley). Even its patriarchal theme creates the perfect sandbox for a movie like this to play in. It’s the clunky execution, the surface-level storytelling, the see-through attempts at subversiveness, and the complete lack of restraint that ultimately weighs the movie down. “Barbie” is in theaters now.

VERDICT – 2 STARS