There are few events in the existence of mankind that are so significant and noteworthy, that they go down in our most treasured history books as general knowledge for generations to come. There’s man’s first trip to the Moon. There’s the fall of the Berlin wall. And now, there’s Barbenheimer.
Okay, I’m obviously exaggerating.
But it’s definitely the current cultural trend to watch the newly released films, Barbie and Oppenheimer, in succession. And as you can see, I caught onto this trend as well.
There’s some debate on which film you should be seeing first. Some say Barbie, because it would otherwise be similar to laughing your ass off after a funeral (i.e. Oppenheimer). Some say Oppenheimer, because you could relax your mind after going through 3 hours of a weighty historical subject. And some say you need to watch both films on the same day.
I personally didn’t have it planned out. In fact, I really wanted to see Oppenheimer, and I didn’t intend to hop onto the Barbenheimer trend.
But then, I just made an off-the-cuff decision to watch Barbie last Friday night — mostly just because I have a crush on Margot Robbie. I watched Oppenheimer the next day.
The Barbenheimer trend likely started out of good fun on social media. It is ridiculous to pair these two motley films together, being so completely different in theme and tone, at least on the outset.
But as I would realize, this trend isn’t so ridiculous after all. What’s more, it actually makes sense.
What’s surprising to me is that watching these two films in succession actually changed my outlook on life in a way, and perhaps, it could do the same for you too.
I had no idea what to expect walking into the cinema for Barbie. I didn’t see any of the trailers, or other promotional material. I didn’t own a pink outfit, either. So, I wore my Red Hot Chili Peppers Return of the Dream Canteen t-shirt (which I guess, had a bit of pink on it — and also some trippy flowers with smiley faces), curtained by my favorite black jacket.
Quickly, though, Barbie struck me as a very unique and creatively hilarious film. It attempted to do many things at once, and it pulled off most of them well. It was a comedy, a fantasy, a critique, as well as a self-critique. I found it interesting how the film adopted a candid attitude towards life, poking fun at Barbie’s dubious history as well as how the world works at large.
What resonated most with me is the unexpected existential angle in the film. We’re introduced to the protagonist Stereotypical Barbie, who lives in a plastic and perfectly monotonous world. As a line in the film goes, “It is the best day ever. So was yesterday, and so is tomorrow, and every day from now until forever.”
Then, suddenly a taste of the real world hits her. She has thoughts of death, and she feels pain and suffering. After experiencing this side of life, she struggles to find herself and her place in her fantasy world. And as she learns to accept this state of imperfection, she finds it harder to relate with perfection.
That’s a lot like us, isn’t it? We go through the same routines every day, we fritter away our precious moments with trivial concerns, as if we have forever to live. It is only when a sudden tragedy happens, like the death of a loved one, shocks us to our core, that we are reminded that our days here are numbered — that very literally, we are dying every day. With death in mind, we find it more doable to reconcile with the suffering and imperfection that inevitably exist in our lives.
In a way, I found it a bit terrifying when the film took this turn. I remember feeling this way watching a Simpsons episode called Homer’s Enemy, in which Homer, who lives a fairly comfortable life despite being so lazy and irresponsible, is envied by one Frank Grimes, a new colleague of his, who has had to work his whole life to the bone for little reward. I felt as though Frank is a real-life character trapped in a nonsensical, topsy-turvy animation that he couldn’t escape from. And in a similar vein, here is Stereotypical Barbie, frozen in an existential dread that she couldn’t understand.
I left the cinema that night feeling broody and introspective. And this feeling lingered on in me as I watched Oppenheimer the next day.
Oppenheimer was a film that I was anticipating for quite a long while. Though, having only watched the Batman trilogy beforehand, I can’t say I’m that huge of a Christopher Nolan fan. It was the subject of Robert Oppenheimer and the Manhattan Project that I was really interested in.
In fact, in an article I wrote back in 2019 titled Confronting The Effects of Creativity and Invention, I shared a little about Oppenheimer and his invention of the atomic bomb, and for doing so, the guilt that haunted him for the rest of his life. Looking back at the article now, there’s so much about my writing that I would ideally change. But nevertheless, it remains one of the articles that I’m most proud of having written.
Oppenheimer was a long journey. But it was worth it. You can tell it was very well thought-out from start to finish, not only by the impeccable acting and the script itself, but most definitely by how beautiful it looks on the silver screen. Each shot is as sublime as a masterly painting, and the film’s under-reliance on CGI paid off in the realism it depicts.
At times, it felt as though I was there in the labs of Los Alamos with Oppenheimer’s band of geniuses, as they had their moments of “technical sweetness”, tinkering night and day and perfecting their weapon of mass destruction. I was almost there in the barren desert, seeing the bomb erupt into an apocalyptic mushroom cloud. I was almost there with Oppenheimer, as the famous passage from the Bhagavad Gita flashed in his mind, “I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.”
The film does have its slow and talky moments, and I can understand why some folks might be put off by that. But I guess being a bit of a history buff, I enjoyed these little “a-ha” moments, as I recognized the historical figures and events that were played out. (If you haven’t watched the film, it’s worth reading up a little on the Manhattan Project and World War II.)
And to add to that, the film went great lengths in portraying Oppenheimer as a complicated and multidimensional person. But personally, I thought that the film was somewhat one-sided in certain aspects. For one thing, it mentioned nothing about the indigenous communities of Los Alamos that were forcibly displaced from their homes in order to make way for the project. It mentioned nothing about the nuclear radiation that affected such communities that lived nearby the testing sites, and how its lasting effects can still be observed today.
Overall, how was the Barbenheimer experience like for me?
At the risk of sounding sadistic towards myself, I honestly expected myself to feel more world-weary, to feel somewhat despaired and hopeless at the state of the world after Oppenheimer was over. But instead, I felt relatively calm and upbeat, and this likely had to do with that lingering introspective mood that Barbie imbued in me.
Oppenheimer made me feel like there are a million reasons why the world is going down the toilet. But watching Barbie beforehand helped me lift my head up and face these things with calm acceptance.
Yes, we might be screwed. There’s climate change, which we aren’t doing enough to overcome. There’s the threat of nuclear war. There’s the possibility of singularity, or technologies such as artificial intelligence taking over our lives. On a more personal level, well, shit happens. Life is constantly changing. One day you’re at the top. The next day you find yourself at the bottom. You might lose your house. You might lose the people you love. You might lose your job.
But such is life, right? The world isn’t meant to last. And it sure as hell isn’t paradise.
In case you’ve forgotten, let it sink in that everything dies. Everyone dies. You will die.
We must never lose sight of the fact that life is temporary and imperfect. And with this being said, we must do our utmost to make every moment count, to care for other people and our environment, and live our best lives — while being mindful on not getting ourselves too attached to anything.
All in all, my Barbenheimer experience reminded me of a Zen parable. There’s this master who owns a beautiful glass cup. He loves drinking from it, and showing it to his visitors. He cherishes the tiny things about it, like the iridescent patterns it makes when it reflects the Sun, and how it rings when he taps his finger on it.
But he often reminds himself that the cup is already broken. And so, one day, when it actually breaks, he would tell himself, “Of course.”
“The real world isn’t what I thought it was.”
“It never is.”– Barbie
Izzat Zailan 