On The Barbenheimer Experience

I didn’t do the full double-feature experience, but within the span of just a few days, I sat in the same theatre on Mission Street to watch the two wildly different films everyone is talking about: Barbie and Oppenheimer. Despite my screenings being just a few days and a few feet away from each other, it was two wildly different experiences at the theater. With streaming services giving us access to vast libraries of content in our living rooms and on our phones, attention to detail around that experience in the theater will become an even bigger part of how films are marketed. 

I saw Barbie at a special party screening by Alamo Drafthouse. After putting on my all-pink outfit and meeting up with friends at a nearby bar, we could instantly spot other Barbie-bound moviegoers on the walkover. They were also wearing pink. In the lobby, we were showered in more pink from the special Barbie merch display, and the audience members in full Barbie drag. In the theater, each seat had a collection of Barbie swag waiting for us. Instead of the normal previews, they played music videos from the soundtrack. At showtime, a woman dressed in a perfect recreation of the original black and white Barbie swimsuit took the stage to welcome us, talk about how much Barbie means to her, and introduce the film. We went to Barbieland for a night.

Oppenheimer was, appropriately, a much more somber experience. Seats were limited, and I didn’t feel like herding cats to coordinate a group, so I just grabbed a ticket for myself. I like seeing movies alone; I know some people hate it, but I enjoy it. I still walked past the big pink Barbie merch table on my way into the theater. I saw plenty of pink outfits from folks seeing Barbie that day, but once inside the auditorium, the mood mellowed. We were all about to watch a very long, very serious movie and were getting comfortable preparing for the journey ahead. 

The massive push around both movies, the Barbenheimer memes, and the experience of walking past posters and displays for both films on my way in and out of the theater made me think about each of them differently than I might have if viewing them uncoupled. Greta Gerwig and Christopher Nolan are both passionate about the craft of filmmaking, and it shows in both movies. Barbie is full of allusions to vintage films and the techniques they used to create heightened realities on studio soundstages. Oppenheimer pushes what can be achieved with in-camera effects and pairs those arresting visuals with a soundtrack and dynamic camera work giving urgency to what, on paper, should be the dullest scenes of men sitting and talking. Both films are about existential crisis. Barbie deciding what kind of woman she wants to be after realizing she hasn’t made the world perfect. Oppenheimer deciding what kind of man he will be after realizing he has made the world irreparably worse. 

I remember watching Dune in my living room in 2021 and wishing I’d been at a theater. There’s something about the short pilgrimage to this dark room full of strangers who have all decided to sit with a film together that I find rewarding. Hearing people cheer when Nicole Kidman’s AMC ad came on at M3GAN perfectly set the tone. If I were younger, I would almost certainly have put on a suit to go see Minions: The Rise of Gru with my friends. 

People throw around the term “eventizing” now to describe this reason for going to a theater vs streaming a movie at home. After the success of Barbenhiemer weekend, that term won’t be going anywhere anytime soon. We’ll see a lot more top-down attempts to make the “event” happen. We’ll probably at least one studio try to release two wildly different films on the same weekend next year, thinking that was what made it work. Gentlemenions and Barbiecore looks will probably lead more studios to try suggesting how you should dress up for their movies, hoping to recreate that social marketing buzz. The emphasis on needing to see something in the IMAX format to get the best experience around films like Dune and Oppenheimer will only continue. TikTok-ready dance moves will keep finding their way into trailers like with M3GAN and Barbie. But I don’t think any of those things are what made Barbenheimer weekend work.

At the end of the day, two films that were worth my time came out on the same weekend. The experience of thinking about each of them individually and in conversation with each other is rewarding because of the excellence and craft put into making them. They are films made as gifts to audiences, not content to be shuffled around for tax write-offs. At a time when two major entertainment unions are on strike fighting for changes that make Hollywood a sustainable business and viable career path, it’s important to remember that you can only market so far past the quality of your product.