Adam Starkey 2–3 minutes
Barbie has become the highest-grossing movie in Warner Bros. history.
Greta Gerwig’s fantasy comedy passed the $1.342billion mark at the global box office on Monday (August 28), beating Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows – Part 2 to become the company’s highest-grossing film ever, not adjusted for inflation.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Barbie is set to become only the 13th movie in history to cross the $600million mark at the US box office later this week. As of Sunday, the film has grossed over $592.8million in the US, and $745.5million in the rest of the world.
The film is also set to beat The Super Mario Bros. Movie ($1.36billion) as the highest-grossing film of 2023 globally in the coming days. When it crosses the milestone, Barbie will become the 15th highest-grossing film of all time.
In a statement to mark the record, Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group co-CEOs, Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy, said: “Reaching this outstanding achievement is a reminder of the power of moviegoers – from countries in every corner of the globe – coming together to further the celebration of an iconic character that has entertained us for so many decades.”
Barbie previously surpassed Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight to become the highest-earning film in Warner Bros. history in the US. Since it was released in July, the film has also become the highest-grossing live-action movie solely directed by a woman.
Starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, Barbie released on the same day as Nolan’s latest film Oppenheimer, creating the “Barbenheimer” phenomena which boosted the success of both films at the box office.
In a four-star review, NME wrote: “What follows is a nuanced, rose-tinted comedy adventure, set to a stonking pop soundtrack featuring Lizzo and Billie Eilish, that somehow lives up to the immense hype. To borrow a pun from Ken’s coolest jacket (out of a long lineup), Barbie is more than ‘kenough’.”
Yeah, because JK Rowling didn’t shitpost and promote her movies on Lemmy, unlike yours truly.
(Also, she doesn’t sound like a very nice person…)
Hey MargotRobbie, what is your favorite community on lemmy?
Why, the ones I moderate, of course!
I’m really happy it’s doing well.
Love Margot and Ryan.
Also, I was afraid of the whole culture war nonsense too. Glad it’s had no impact at all.
The culture war nonsense probably helped. People love controversy.
A triumph of corporate propaganda.
Oh fuck off. It’s a good movie.
Not a masterpiece tho. It doesn’t want to be a complex movie and succeeds at it. It’s basically a fun experience with no real deeper meaning, just 2 hours of some laughs, at least for me
Yep, just finally watched it on Sunday and was very letdown by all the hype. It was okay, but the comedy completely missed the mark until the third act when Alan starts beating up Kens. Could have had a hell of a lot more fun with the concept. They didn’t seem to have any idea what they wanted the message of the movie to be, so they just threw a bunch of shit at the audience that didn’t really say anything. Glad I watched Oppenheimer on opening night instead. That movie was a masterpiece.
Agree 100%
I would absolutely say it has some deeper meaning.
The deeper meaning is just “but feminism” and then makes feminist jokes
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How can you say it doesn’t have a deeper meaning? They go on a 10 minute long monologue where they’re just directly telling viewers how to manipulate men, and the whole last 1/3 of the movie is basically a political message.
Again, that’s not deep and it has no meaning apart from “our company has been called sexist, now we’re “proving” we’re actually 100% feminist”
It can be many things. There’s no need to be rude about it though. Bitch.
Looks like someone’s tapped into a new market!
I was wondering where all the right wing “gamer” chuds from Reddit were. I see they have been found in this comment section. Or is it specifically this instance that they’ve all conglomerated in?
They’re mostly being drowned out by the apparently unspoken alliance between open source supporting apolitical types and far left. The only loud rightists are the islamophobic nominal liberals.
I enjoyed most of the movie, but started getting bored about 3/4 of the way through. Then I was really disappointed with the final political messages. I thought it was going to show a resolution through inclusion and equality, but they seem to continue the power imbalance at the end and even dedicated a scene to showing that they will not give any of the Kens any representation in their government, basically keeping things as they were before. The core message seems to be “use manipulation and deceit to get power, and then keep that power solely for your own group”. Did anyone else feel that way? Did I misinterpret something?
Sort of, but the Kens did run the society extremely poorly and then try to kill each other. Remember these are dolls. Ken is literally created to be a stupid himbo.
Yeah, the Barbies ran everything but clearly the Kens were not up to the job. The best outcome is the Kens learning to be their own people, not Barbies’ accessories. It not a real society, it’s about personal growth.
Right, the movie takes place in make-believe universe. But the messaging is definitely supposed to represent real world issues and perspectives, and I was disappointed that they didn’t use it to share a message of equality at the end.
Barbie isn’t the greatest movie, but at least it has a better message than the fascist wizard series.
What’s wrong with Harry potters message?
In an online Q&A, author Ursula Le Guin was asked for her opinion on JK Rowling’s writing style. Quote: “I have no great opinion of it. When so many adult critics were carrying on about the “incredible originality” of the first Harry Potter book, I read it to find out what the fuss was about, and remained somewhat puzzled; it seemed a lively kid’s fantasy crossed with a “school novel”, good fare for its age group, but stylistically ordinary, imaginatively derivative, and ethically rather mean-spirited.” There is more to the Q&A, but frankly, this adult critic has no great opinion of it.
Well that’s one person’s opinion of it (I assume you share their opinion?). Not sure what makes it fascist or even “ethically mean spirited.”
I thought it was a great story of friendship and love overcoming difficulties in life.
…and a race of slaves who benefit from their station.
I think fascists is too much. But it has a rather conservative view on the world. Harry Potter, the character, fights to maintain and later return the status quo of society and people who want to change it, like Hermione with the house elves are viciously mocked. Slavery is okay, they like to be enslaved, Dobby is just a weirdo.
In short I’d say the issue is that the Harry Potter stories propose that individuals are the problem, not the system, even if the system has very clear flaws shown to us.
And what is the system but many individuals?
It’s not “many” individuals, but a very few individuals. That’s the point.
If 99% of the people in a system went against the remaining 1%, I assure you the system would be different
I have read many, many fiction stories. I agree with Ursula’s opinion. You could take the magic out of the series and put it on London streets and it would still be full of classism, racist tropes, narcissistic role models, and a weak story overall. If you enjoy it, fine. I could suggest a dozen stories and series that address the same issues with greater nuance and skill.
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Not if they have good taste.
By all means, suggest them. I love good stories.
And it’s art. I’m not going to discount a story that made me feel deeply just because the author isn’t as skillful as another.
And is writing (or any art) about topics that are very much present in the real world to be discouraged? Should every piece of art ignore reality and just portray utopia?
If you didn’t enjoy it, fine. That’s art. It’s subjective. But to call it fascist is just…weird.
It would be weird if JKR wasn’t actually a fascist and if she didn’t reinforce negative stereotypes in every one of her more recent additions to the stories. Did you see the goblin bankers in Wizarding World?
As for book series including magic, there’s always the classics, Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, and Madeleine l’Engle. I’m a huge fan of the intersection of magic and technology so I would also suggest the authors Neal Stephenson, Greg Egan, and Liu Cixin. If you’re looking for heady dialogue that includes mysticism and philosophy, try Hermann Hesse.
Here’s my not-quite-up-to-date reading list sorted by rating on Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/89724732?ref=nav_mybooks&sort=rating
I guess that gets into separating the art from the artist - which is its own conversation. I don’t care for JK Rowling as a person, but then again I don’t like what a lot of many great artists have done. I had to make that decision for myself whether or not I was ok with consuming art from troubled human beings and to what level (monetarily and influence-wise). Ultimately I just make that decision on a case-by-case basis.
Thanks for the recommendations. I’ll probably start by digging into Herman Hesse. I have some audible credits that need to be put to use.
The main message is love conquers all. It just screams fascism.
To be fair, the context of blood purity isn’t really dealt with enough - evidenced by the dearth of fanfiction on the damn thing. ‘Limpieza de sangre’ isn’t just an interesting Harry Potter x Female Tom Riddle fanfiction - it’s also, according to wiki: literally “cleanliness of blood” and meaning “blood purity”, was a racially discriminatory term used in the Spanish and Portuguese Empires, with connections to the Inquisition that nobody expected.
Can you give any support for this claim using just sources from the series?
Aside from the classism and cruelty of the narcissistic mentors, I don’t have much to say about the original series. It does suggest that even if magic were real that the world would be run by a hierarchy of rulers that enforced a strict separation between the magical class and the muggles though. Also, Wizarding World uses Nazi caricatures of Jews as goblins and JKR is truly an ignorant and hateful person.
Whole lot of buzzwords here without much substance. Fascism is… mean teachers?? None of what you suggested is exclusive to fascism and you’re grasping at straws.
Also Fascism =/= antisemitism and you’re insulting millions of Jews who have experienced antisemitism outside of Fascism for implying as such. Plus the caricatures predate the Nazis by centuries. JKR is ignorant but your comment makes no sense to describe a series whose main villain is the most on-the-nose (no pun intended) Hitler stand-in in literature.
You talk like one of them. Splitting hairs and hiding them behind each other’s atrocities.
everyone I dont like is a Nazi
Words have meaning dumbass. Harry Potter sucks and JK Rowling is a pos, but HP is not pro-fascism in any way. You’d put up a good argument if there was any real support for that statement.
The main message is, “Get back in your box, muggle.”
Why not ask the sorting hat? Probably because he’d make you a hufflepuff, then the teachers would steal your points and give them to the privileged kids.
Oh shit the dude just victimised themselves with the fucking Harry Potter houses 💀💀💀
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Looking at u/@TrismegistusMx 's post history and viewing its sheer volume of smoothbrain thoughts (but also interspersed with rare moments of lucid deep intellect) it would seem that the real problem they have with the underlying message in the Harry Potter books is that education is an imaginative, magical experience.
Hey coward, how about addressing any one of your concerns directly with me instead of insulting my character from the peanut gallery?
Hello. You are indeed intelligent and very possibly extremely attractive. I have no idea. Regardless, I apologize for the shit-tier non-sequitur. You deserve better.
Compliments are always nice, but I’m more interested having an actual conversation than flattery or shit talking.
You talk so much shit for someone talking out of their ass to be disrespectful. Sounds like you just got upset that someone is pointing out that your favorite series isn’t that impressive to them.
Nope, I agree with them that HP is not inspiring nor original. Doesn’t remove the fact that it’s still popular and inspiring for kids everywhere and still admirably fantastical and whimsical.
I have plenty of problems with JK Rowlings recent attitudes towards certain disenfranchised groups, but I have a hard time interpreting Harry Potter as “fascist”. The entire premise is diametrically opposed to fascism. The latter four books show how fascists use fearmongering and populist rhetoric in the press to take over democratic institutions.
What I find frustrating about the whole situation is how Rowling seems to have fallen victim to some of the very same patterns her own books warned against.
Is Harry Potter ever critical of the sorting hat, or the anti-muggle prejudice of the magical class? Oh look, there’s a whole discussion about the politics in Harry Potter on Wikipedia: https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Harry_Potter#:~:text=The “pure-blood”%2C,racism in J. K. Rowling’s texts.
My problem with these comparisons is that the text itself reads as critical of them. All this class segregation nonsense (purebloods, mudbloods, etc.) is very explicitly pushed by the antagonists and rejected by the protagonists. The reader is supposed to be disgusted when they learn what it meant when Malfoy called Hermione a “dirty little mudblood”. The whole series is essentially an allegory for how classist and racist sentiments lead to systemic opression, even if the work itself still endorses a now-antiquated status quo.
Really this whole argument is undercut by the fact that the main antagonist faction is a clear allegory for 20th century fascist movements. There is plenty to criticize about Harry Potter (and even more to criticize about its author), but to call the work pro-fascist makes it sound like you never actually read the books and got your information from a list of bullet points without context, and makes it way harder to talk about the problems it does have.
the text itself reads as critical of them
Precisely. Even the Sorting Hat itself is critical of the Sorting Hat, in-universe.
That can only be said of the original work. JKR keeps doubling down. When there are so many other amazing series being neglected, it’s just a shame to see people cling to such a mediocre world and story. It starts to make a person wonder if there’s something underneath the compulsion, like shared beliefs.
Maybe people are just extra nostalgic for books that were a major part of their childhoods? Nothing “new” can really replace that without access to a time machine.
That’s on them, but you have to put the blankie away eventually. Arrested development is never a good look. I admit that I enjoy many of Orson Scott Card’s books. As far as I can tell he never has let his personal beliefs influence his worlds in a negative way, but I would never defend the man or any twisted philosophies he may put in his works.
Orson Scott Card is a great example. I still love Ender’s Game, but I want little to do with his newer work because of his nasty anti-LGBT behavior.
I’m the same with JKR. I want nothing to do with the Fantastic Beasts movies or her newer books. My relationship with her ends with Deathly Hallows.
May I enquire… as to your gender?
“the fascist wizard series” 💀💀💀
Well, nobody likes Saruman.
