The other day, my son bemoaned people who couldn’t just enjoy the silly movies from their childhood, like Star Wars or Indiana Jones, because they had to find a reason to justify the continuation of their early filmic love into adulthood. So, they create a form of criticism that makes their adoration of juvenilia acceptable, even erudite, elevating simple, fun movies to high art or of great social import (which then naturally leads to a concomitant acceptability of their living at home in the basement amongst their toys well into their 30s).

To be fair, I added the parenthetical.

I thought about what he said when I was watching Barbie. Of course, it will be the subject of Gender Studies papers for the next 20 years, and has already spawned reviews of great seriousness (“a searing social critique”; “An earnest feminist manifesto inside a barbed social satire”; an “existential exegesis on what it means to be a woman, and a human”).

There are indeed very smart things in Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach’s script, including some clever, contemporary touches and social observations. Some land and some elicit a groan.

However, the movie works best as a series of jokes and physical humor encased in a startlingly resonant set design and an energetic commitment to unbridled fun.

That it lightly lampoons patriarchy, consumerism, wokeness, feminism, bro’ culture, capitalism, and much more is undeniable. But that is icing. The cake is the yuks, and Gerwig offers an endless parade of laugh-out-loud lines and sight gags and rousing musical dance numbers, almost all of which land and charm.

A few nits.

I am sick of Will Ferrell. He’s the same schtick, every single time, and he is lazy and boring.

Also, there’s an inspiring speech that screeches the flow to a halt. A rousing feminist speech. To dolls. It’s a bit like watching a character in Star Wars give a soliloquy about colonialism. To Wookies.

The picture is also a bit repetitive and long in its syrupy, maudlin end (though it lands on a great crack to close out).

But these are annoyances. The film opens wondrously, as we are introduced to Barbieland, where everything is perfect; what is not perfect is plainly identified as such (aka, “Weird Barbie” and “Pregnant Barbie”); girls rule; and the Kens serve and bicker amongst themselves, vying for the attention of their masters. But the perfect world of one Barbie (Margot Robbie) begins to crack (her arches fall, she thinks of death), the real world beckons, and she answers the call with a besotted Ken (Ryan Gosling) as a stowaway. There, she finds sadness, men in power, and her own obsolescence. When she is gone, an empowered Gosling returns to Barbieland, and the Kens rise, in hilarious fashion.

After checking its social responsibility box with indelible ink, the picture ramps up as the Barbies use their superior intellects and, interestingly, their feminine wiles, to overthrow the dum dum Kens during their short-lived reign.

This allows for Gosling’s musical numbers, which are worth the entire movie. There is no way around it. He steals this picture. It crackles in every frame in which he appears, and his resume’ as a strong comedic actor (The Nice Guys, Crazy Stupid Love) has expanded.

And “I’m Just Ken” is undeniably the best musical number EVER!