Lord God, keep your Mattel Cinematic Universe to yourself
Christ me, it doesn’t end, does it? The boulder of inevitability just keeps rolling down that hill, just as surely as Kate Bush keeps running back up it. The dreaded news recently arrived that Mattel, the toy company behind the famed children’s playthings Barbie and Ken, Hot Wheels and even Uno, are looking to make more movies after the release of the Greta Gerwig-directed effort Barbie, a project famously starring Ryan Gosling and Margot Robbie.
There’s a real sense of anticipation in the air for Barbie, at once a celebration of the sometimes-derided doll and a simultaneous satire of the whole culture surrounding her. From what we’ve seen from previews and trailers of Gerwig’s movie, Barbie promises to be a coy examination of pre and post-teen feminism, capitalism in the eyes of Mattel themselves, and just a general riotous laugh at the ridiculous notion of the damn thing itself.
However, it looks as though Mattel don’t want to put the toys back in the cupboard just there. In an article in The New Yorker entitled ‘After Barbie, Mattel is raiding its Entire Toybox’, journalist Alex Barasch detailed all the different plans that the toy company giant has to bring their products to life on the big screen. What began as a joyous novelty with Barbie, a tongue-in-cheek examination of the very nature of toys and their commercial onslaught, looks to be moving into the dreaded realm of a, brace yourself, a cinematic universe.
We’ve already been made well aware of the J.J. Abrams Hot Wheels movie, surely as abhorrent as it sounds on the surface. In addition, Vin Diesel attached to a Rock’ Em Rock’ Em Robots film – whatever in hell’s name that will look like, we simply do not want to conceive. But it somehow gets worse because even Daniel Kaluuya, an actor of the highest order, has somehow been dragged into producing one of a picture from our worst nightmares.
The British actor is currently attached to a Barney the Dinosaur movie. But by the sounds of the plans, this Barney will no longer be full of the love and kindness with which we normally associate him, but rather sees him come to a “surreal, A24-style” film aimed at adults of the Millennial generation and their ever-growing anxiety at the current state of the world.
There’s another issue at hand here, though, and it comes down to the initial marketing of this unwarranted Barney movie. Why is it being pitched as an “A24-type” production? As though that were to signify some sort of definitive style or theme. The truth is that some A24 movies are great, and others are not. Merely uttering the name of the production company (despite them not actually making the film) does not guarantee any semblance of quality, just as Doncaster Rovers wanting to employ a “Barcelona-style” of play does not make it so.
But back to the issue at hand, it feels like unholy territory we’re sitting on here. The truth is that the realm of cinema is already living in the age of remakes, adaptations and an utter lack of original storytelling. Then again, cinema-goers – or at least box office generators – seem to be more compelled to dispense with their hard-earned cash on a concept they at least have some initial basis of understanding with. What is known is wanted, its comfort craved.
By contrast, original narratives are quickly falling by the wayside. But we need them desperately. Otherwise, we risk feeding the ever-growing hyperreality that continues to threaten to swallow us whole, and down the chute we go, with Barbie, with Marvel and DC, the remakes and the reboots, kissing goodbye to the previous 100 years of culture to the cultural whirlpool that has become the 21st century.
OK, perhaps I’m looking too far into this, and each Mattel film (45 are currently said to be in development) ought to be judged on its own merit. But it really feels like what began as a humorous notion with Mattel’s undoubted biggest star toy has quickly become nothing but venture capitalism, diametrically opposed to what we ought to consider genuine cinema. And can we really say we’re surprised? This is a toy company we’re dealing with, after all, one that plays second fiddle only to the Lego Company. They’re certainly not cinematic auteurs, no matter how much they claim to admire the works of hitherto independent filmmakers.
Perhaps Barney, Hot Wheels, and Rock’ Em Sock’ Em Robots will turn out to be masterpieces of contemporary cinema, immediately placed into the eternal chambers of the filmic canon. But even saying that sentence feels wrong, right? Time will tell, I suppose, but don’t expect this writer, growing more cynical by the day, to have any hopes for this intellectual property obsession to be anything more than an utter shitstorm.
