‘Barbie’ mastermind Greta Gerwig believes her movie is as iconic as current superhero productions

If anyone panicked about getting the right color saturation for the world of Barbie beyond the pink that everyone – the public, the film industry, producers and of course the giant Mattel – was expecting Greta Gerwig, the American director responsible for the project which will open in Ecuador on Thursday, July 20.

She is considered one of the most talented filmmakers in Hollywood, and she rose to that place by directing a low-budget subgenre: the mumble or, in Spanish, independent cinema focused on dialogue, naturalness, relationships and emotions of young people and improvisation.

With that backgroundGerwig arrives in Barbie’s world, literally painted hot pink, as he refused to use CGI even to recreate the backgrounds, let alone capture the protagonist’s perfect feet. The scene in the trailer where Margot Robbie impeccably takes off Barbie’s pink heels and stands on her toes has been cut, said the Australian actress, with tape, a bar to keep balance and a good pedicure. In an artificial paradise, Gerwig kept it as natural as possible. Otherwise it would have been “a nightmare,” he said on the set of the show Australian The project.

He explained his view on that Barbie. “It’s a movie about people, and it’s for everyone”, responded to the question whether he had made a film about dolls and whether this would be of interest to the general public. She notes that like such familiar toys, we’ve given them stories and created a power dynamic between them that reflects our desires and aspirations. What’s happening inside Barbie we made it among all of us who have ever owned one. Or a lot.

Gerwig is the director of Barbie by Robbie’s decision: She was the one who called her for the position. “There were a lot of ways to get it wrong, but if we got it right it could be huge; and I think Greta did well. There are very few people I would want to do this with. Greta was at the top of the list.”

Brian Hyatt interviewed her for Rolling Stone magazine

but before BarbieAs we started saying, Gerwig already had a very interesting career in Hollywood, largely in partnership with her filmmaker husband, Noah Baumbach, with whom she did Greenberg, Frances Ha And mistress america. By co-writing the scripts for the latter two, she was able to launch herself as a comedy writer and director. Lady Bird (2017), which earned him his first Oscar nomination for Best Picture and a Golden Globe in the same category. And he wrote and directed his version of little women (2019), both films starring Saoirse Ronan.

Barbie co-written with Baumbach, it is her biggest project to date and for all audiences, as she herself has admitted. “I’ve never been a part of anything like this before, but in a way the bottom line is the same,” he said in a recent interview with Brian Hyatt for the magazine. rolling stones. “Although it is Barbie and it is an internationally known brand, the film feels very personal, as intimate as Lady Bird or little women”.

In that idyllic place, Barbieland, there is no aging, disease, pain or death. When Barbie has to get out of there, Gerwig associates that with what happens in religious literature: the person he must leave paradise to confront what he couldn’t see before, which is outside. And one of the first things Barbie sees is an older woman, something she never had a chance to see. And it looks beautiful.

Who is that woman? “Costume designer Ann Roth. A legend. On the first shoot, I was suggested to cut (the scene), because it was a closed-off alley, a moment that went nowhere. Without her, the story would remain the same. And I said, ‘If I cut the scene, I don’t know what this movie is about.’ I love that scene.”

Margot Robbie has said that the first time she read the script she loved it and was absolutely sure the great powers would never let them take it. Gerwig acknowledges it’s a “wild” script, and she took it even further on set, making it an explosion of color. He still doesn’t know how they let him go.

“I never wanted my adult tastes to bury what I loved as a kid. When I was 8 years old I loved anything that was the biggest, colorful, loud and bright I could find. And I have to honor that. I don’t want (the movie) to be full of adult flavors”.

One of those childhood quirks was Ryan Gosling playing Ken. ‘Margot and I don’t take no for an answer. We always knew we were doing this for Ryan. And I didn’t even know him.” And so they reinvented their acting careers, this time as comedians. Working with Gosling and Robbie, Gerwig says, made her feel like she could direct movies for a long time and never see anything as unique again.

And then? How about a superhero movie? Yes, of course, says Gerwig, who already has it in his agenda the first two movies of The Chronicles of Narnia for netflix. But whatever it is, he’ll do it his way. “A well-filmed and well-executed action movie is simply amazing. It’s a dance. I’ve never done anything like this.”

Greta Gerwig’s manager is Jeremy Barber, who received requests from Mattel executives to revise the entire script and stopped them before losing the writers and director. In a report of New Yorker, Barber has expressed mixed feelings about Barbie. “Is it okay for our good actors and filmmakers to live in a world where they can only make mass consumer-oriented products? Don’t know. That’s the business. So, if this is what people are going to consume, let’s make it more interesting, more complicated”.

As for the star director, she’s pretty clear: they’ve built a career that can go beyond small-budget dramas. “Her ambition is not to be the greatest female director, but to be the greatest studio boss. AND Barbie It appealed to her.”