Barbie, the global sensation, has been lauded for its existential themes and treatment of patriarchy, identity, and feminism. But Stephanie Garcia challenges the applause. Looking at the film through the lens of Simone De Beauvoir she argues that the film falls short of an existential masterpiece. “Do you guys ever think about dying?” A single line that seemed to beckon a wave of accolades touting “Barbie” as an existentialist movie for our age. Yet, behind the trailer lies a film that teeters on the edge of pseudo-philosophical exploration, with its existential and feminist themes. “Barbie” appears no more than a thinly veiled veneer atop a commodity-driven toy-selling narrative. And on reflection can it live up to the existentialist feminist thought of Simone de Beauvoir, an existentialist thinker whose seminal work “The Second Sex” offers a healthy riposte to a surface-level exploration of feminism?Simone de Beauvoir’s analysis of women’s struggle is…
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