The wildly pervasive cultural phenomenon that is Barbenheiming – aka seeing both Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer in quick succession – doesn’t seem to be going away any time soon, at least not if opening box-office numbers are anything to go by. Still, let’s be real: eventually we are going to hit peak Barbenheimer, if we haven’t already.
While I personally feel like I could watch Barbie at least two to three more times (it should be noted that I do not feel this way about Oppenheimer, which has already used up three hours of my one wild and precious life), I also long to recapture the magic of watching not one but two movies within a 24-hour period. Call it double-feature madness, call it a throwback to the days when people actually went to the movies for multiple hours without scrolling on social media throughout.
But, ultimately, I want more; hence I’ve compiled a list of pairing suggestions for films that embrace both the pastel pink fantasy fun of Barbie and the gloomy, chilling, ultimately educational vibe of Oppenheimer. (Did I know Albert Einstein was involved in the Manhattan Project? Absolutely not. Thanks, failing education system!)
Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999) and A Beautiful Mind (2001)
Granted, Michael Patrick Jann’s black comedy mockumentary about a small-town beauty pageant isn’t quite Barbie scaled, but there’s plenty of glitz and glamour and satire of overt femininity to go around. Once you’re done catching up with the teenage girls of Mount Rose, Minnesota, dive into Ron Howard’s portrayal of Nobel-winning mathematician John Nash – but bear in mind that the film differs greatly from the IRL story, which might just drive you crazy if you’re a history buff.
Legally Blonde (2001) and Reversal of Fortune (1990)
We’re getting legal themed with this one, folks: Nothing brightens up a dreary weekday like taking a trip into Legally Blonde protagonist Elle Woods’s pink, glittery, giggly yet extremelylegal-minded world – and for a chaser, dip into Barbet Schroeder’s legal drama adapted from Alan Dershowitz’s 1985 book Reversal of Fortune: Inside the von Bülow Case. (If you hail from Gen Z, ask your mom or weird aunt who Sunny von Bülow is. Also, don’t forget sunscreen, even if it’s cloudy out. Sorry.)
13 Going on 30 (2004) and The Post (2017)
Journalism-movie time! I will always have a soft spot in my heart for Jennifer Garner as a teen in a grown woman’s body, trying to make the media industry less toxic (good luck), and I think that fine film pairs well with Steven Spielberg’s political drama about The Washington Post’s attempts to publish the Pentagon Papers. Plus: Meryl Streep!
Enchanted (2007) and Deepwater Horizon (2016)
Hey, you said you wanted froth cut with severity, right? Taking in a live-action Disney romp before an intense environmental-disaster film based on a true story might be… intense, but you could always reverse the order and end on an Enchanted high note.
Life Size (2000) and Dr. Strangelove (1964)
This is probably the most directly Barbenheimer-inspired pairing on this list, so if you’re in the mood to watch a doll turn real (especially when that doll is played by Tyra Banks) and then dive directly into a Kubrick-ian satire about nuclear war, this is the one for you.
Editor
Emma SpecterCredit
Lead Image: © 2001 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios via IMDb