Mark Ronson Clapped Back At Bill Maher, Who Called The ‘Barbie’ Movie ‘Preachy’ And ‘Man-Hating’ In A Widely Panned Review

So many people like the Barbie movie that it just surpassed $1 billion in box office earnings. There are still haters, though, like Ben Shapiro and Bill Maher, the latter of whom just shared a widely-panned review of the movie. His tweet about the film begins, “OK, ‘Barbie’: I was hoping it wouldn’t be preachy, man-hating, and a #ZombieLie – alas, it was all three. What is a Zombie Lie? Something that never was true, but certain people refuse to stop saying it (tax cuts for the rich increase revenues, e.g.); OR something that USED to be true but no longer is, but certain people pretend it’s still true. ‘Barbie’ is this kind of #ZombieLie.”

He goes on to address the movie’s depiction of Mattel’s board, and Mark Ronson (who oversaw the Barbie soundtrack) used that to poke fun at Maher. In response to the review, Ronson tweeted last night (August 8), “We come to this place for magic. We come to AMC theaters to laugh, to cry, to care… and to furiously google ‘mattel board configuration’ while others are trying to enjoy a f***king magnificent comedy”

Find Maher’s full review below.

“OK, ‘Barbie’: I was hoping it wouldn’t be preachy, man-hating, and a #ZombieLie – alas, it was all three. What is a Zombie Lie? Something that never was true, but certain people refuse to stop saying it (tax cuts for the rich increase revenues, e.g.); OR something that USED to be true but no longer is, but certain people pretend it’s still true. ‘Barbie’ is this kind of #ZombieLie.

Spoiler alert, Barbie fights the Patriarchy. Right up to the Mattel board who created her, consisting of 12 white men! The Patriarchy! Except there’s a Mattel board in real life, and it’s 7 men and 5 women. OK, not perfect even-steven, but not the way the board IN THE MOVIE – which takes place in 2023 – is portrayed. And not really any longer deserving of the word ‘patriarchy.’ Yes, there was one, and remnants of it remain – but this movie is so 2000-LATE.

At one point the Barbies have to win over the Kens, and they are told to do it by pretending to act helpless and not know how to do stuff. Helen Gurley Brown called, she wants her premise back. Yes, that WAS a thing. I saw ‘Barbie’ with a woman in her 30s who said, ‘I don’t know a single woman of any age who would act like that today.’

I know, I know, ‘How could I know about the patriarchy, I AM a man!’ That argument is so old and so silly. Of course, none of us can know exactly what others go through life, but I can see the world around me, and I can read data. The real Mattel board is a pretty close mirror of the country, where 45% of the 449 board seats filled last year in Fortune 500 companies were women. Truth is, I’m not the one who’s out of step – I’m living in the year we’re living in. Barbie is fun, I enjoyed it – but it IS a #ZombieLie. And people who don’t go along with zombie lies did not take some red pill – just staying true to CURRENT reality. Let’s live in the year we’re living in! Hi Ken!!! #BarbieMovie.”