Barbie

‘Will Freya find a lovely birthday gift for mummy?’: why the Sylvanian Families movie is the anti-Barbie

The trailer for the new film about the dainty woodland creatures will wash over your brain like a warm 70-second bath. Does every toy movie need to be an Oscar-worthy social commentary?

Stuart Heritage

17, Mar, 2025 @4:01 PM

A Wicked shame! In 2025, blockbuster success spells Oscars failure

The Oz-set blockbuster, plus the Inside Out and Dune sequels, packed out cinemas but won’t win best picture at Sunday’s Academy Awards

Catherine Shoard and Raphael Boyd

01, Mar, 2025 @7:00 AM

Much Ado About Ken: Barbie style star is still making menswear shimmer

Almost two years on from film’s debut, Ryan Gosling character’s himbo look has reached the West End in London

Chloe Mac Donnell

21, Feb, 2025 @12:50 PM

Glicked double bill may not match Barbenheimer buzz, experts say

Gladiator II and Wicked getting people into theatres but unlikely to replicate phenomenon of Barbie-Oppenheimer release

Nadia Khomami Arts and culture correspondent

23, Nov, 2024 @7:00 AM

Gladdington and Glicked: will these weird, wild double bills beat Barbenheimer?

There are a lot of big movies out this November, including Gladiator 2, Paddington 3 and Wicked. So should you watch them all in one afternoon?

20, Nov, 2024 @5:25 PM

Being dangerously thin is back in. Is the body-positivity era officially over? | Arwa Mahdawi

The American Society of Plastic Surgeons put their Botoxed heads together and decreed this the ‘ballet body’ era

Arwa Mahdawi

12, Oct, 2024 @1:00 PM

A Virginia Woolf Barbie? Is this really the most inappropriate doll of all time?

Mattel has already produced plastic fantastic versions of Maya Angelou and Queen Camilla. What’s so special about the author of Orlando?

07, Oct, 2024 @1:36 PM

‘She just unravels so beautifully’: how Nicole Kidman conquered the world – then kept on going

The mercurial actor, who has won best actress award at Venice film festival for Babygirl, continues to be feted for her genre-jumping roles. Happily, her artistic journey is far from over

Leila Latif

08, Sep, 2024 @10:00 AM

Can Travis Knight’s He-Man movie do for boys what Greta Gerwig’s Barbie did for girls?

It’s hard to imagine Masters of the Universe ploughing quite the same meta-infused furrow but in the right hands, it might be ripe for forward-thinking, culturally adept satire

Ben Child

06, Sep, 2024 @11:18 AM

‘I don’t think I have that in me’: what was Lena Dunham’s abandoned Polly Pocket movie actually going to involve?

In a post-Barbie world, feminism plus toy equals box office paydirt – but after three years working on the script, Dunham decided she could no longer continue. Why?

Stuart Heritage

10, Jul, 2024 @10:27 AM

Barbie: The Exhibition review – the wonder doll’s evolution, from Gehry homes to ‘gay Ken’

Deep dive into the pink plastic universe charts society’s cultural, design, fashion and body-image changes – reflected in the life of the world’s most popular doll

Oliver Wainwright

03, Jul, 2024 @4:05 PM