Barbie is undoubtedly the film of 2023, with Greta Gerwig’s feminist blockbuster breaking box office records, prompting the Kenergy movement and resurging the Barbiecore fashion trend.
And from America Ferrera’s empowering speech to the predicted Oscar nominations for Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling and Greta Gerwig, Barbie is still all anyone can talk about.
The record-breaking film has acquired an army of super fans with Barbie’s hidden easter eggs and clever cultural references – everything from the Bratz nod to the Chanel collaboration.
(Image credit: Courtesy of Warner Bros Media)
This week, it was a hidden easter egg that went viral that we all managed to miss, as a detail surfaced around the “real world” montage.
At the end of the film when Barbie is deciding whether she wants to remain in Barbieland or leave to live in the real world as a human, she shares a special moment with her creator Ruth Handler.
Handler holds Barbie’s hands to show her what the real world is really like, and a beautiful montage of “real world” footage plays to Billie Eilish’s What Was I Made For? The footage features multiple home movies – everything from birthdays and celebrations to everyday life moments.
Greta Gerwig has recently opened up about this montage, revealing that the footage is very personal, with the home movies supplied by the cast and crew – featuring them and their loved ones.
In a recent interview, Gerwig explained that the scene was created to say “this is only ever made by human beings. Movies, dolls: Human beings make them. There was something about Ruth Handler, inventor of Barbie, this idea that she made the doll Barbie for her daughter Barbara, and just that human connection.
“Every film I make has to come from a personal place,” Gerwig recalled. “I’ve always wanted to have a ‘film by’ [credit] and have a card with every single person who worked on a film because what I love about movies is it’s a collective art form.”
Well, this is lovely.