The story of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie movie has been kept under wraps for a long time, and viewers have been given little tidbits of what they’ll be able to see in the film. Now Warner Bros. have unveiled the first major trailer for the film, which is set to hit theaters on July 21.
In it, we see how Margot Robbie’s Barbie is tired of the idyllic world of parties, beaches, surfing and dancing in which she lives, and questions about the world beyond the borders of Barbieland begin to preoccupy her.
So she decides to embark on a journey to the real world to find answers to her troubled thoughts. Surprisingly, Ken (Ryan Gosling) also goes on this journey with her.
The two will face the harsh reality in which the world has outlived Barbie’s candy pink dreams, indulging in cynicism. She and Ken even end up in custody after the blonde slaps a man who spanked her on the beach.
But as the two immigrants from the world of Barbieland get to know the harsh world outside, corporations begin to worry about a living doll entering reality. And Will Farrell’s character (“The Host”) is willing to do anything to get Barbie and Ken back into the cardboard boxes where he thinks they belong.
In addition to directing “Barbie,” Greta Gerwig (“Little Women”) also wrote the screenplay with her director husband, Noah Baumbach. Together, they decided not to show their work to the film studio, Warner Bros, nor to Barbie’s manufacturer, Mattel, until they had completed it.
Attempts to hide the plot from the audience also left a lot of room for speculation.
Margot Robbie herself recently commented on how she felt humiliated after photos from the film’s set were leaked online and sparked a flurry of comments.
“We looked like we were laughing and having fun, but we were actually dying inside. (…) I thought it was the most humiliating moment of my life,” she said on Jimmy Fallon’s show.
“I knew we had some exterior locations to shoot in Los Angeles. I knew once we did the exteriors, we’d be blown away. There’d probably be a small crowd of people paying attention because, you know, we kind of stand out with those outfits. So I knew there would be some attention and probably some pictures would leak, but I had no idea what would happen,” the actress added at the time.
However, she defended the film, which she said was “kind of genius”. In an interview with Vogue, Robbie talked about the development that “Barbie” went through before arriving at the finished product.
In the interview, the actress talks about a joke on the very first page of the script, written by Greta Gerwig and her husband Noah Baumbach, that left the actress and the head of the Mattel Films co-production company Tom Ackerly “with his mouth open.”
“We just looked at each other, there was pure panic on our faces. We were both like, ‘Holy shit! Shit!” Robbie recalls.
She said she was impressed with the script, but had deep doubts that this version of the film would ever be made.
“I think the first thing I said to Tom was, ‘This is so genius. It’s a shame we’ll never be able to make this movie,” the actress said.
Robbie explains that while this mysterious and edgy joke was cut from the script, in practice it was left largely intact by the editors. And we will see in the film what she liked so much.
Along with Robbie and Ryan Gosling in “Barbie” we will see an all-star cast including Will Ferrell, Connor Swindells, Nicola Coughlan, Emerald Fennell, Kate McKinnon, Michael Cera, America Ferrera, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Rhea Perlman, Sharon Rooney, Anna Cruz Kane, Ritu Arya, Jamie Demetriou, Emma Mackie, Dua Lipa, Issa Rae, Harry Neff, Alexandra Shipp, Simu Liu, Scott Evans and Nkuti Gatwa.
