When asked how I wanted to spend my twenty-third birthday this summer; I only had one word in my mind: “Barbenheimer,” a social media and cultural phenomenon that is bringing people back to the theater.  

Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” was the first movie of the pair that I saw in cinema. I had to wait for days, since my local theater was sold out of tickets until the third week of what can only be described as “Barbie-mania.” I didn’t know what to expect from a film about a plastic doll, since I didn’t grow up as a devoted fan of “Barbie,” and I wouldn’t have the nostalgic feeling that many had while reliving their childhoods. 

The plot of “Barbie” can best be described as a combination of Disney Channel’s “Teen Beach Movie” and “Legally Blonde” or “Clueless.” When the audience meets Barbie (Margot Robbie), she is happily living in her dreamhouse, but starts to experience a mid-life crisis when her thoughts become less than fantastic. 

After being told she must find the girl playing with her, Barbie, accompanied by Ken (Ryan Gosling), journeys to the real world to undo what has been done. While Barbie is on her mission in the real world, Ken becomes enamored by the way that men are being treated in the real world and tries to bring the same respect to the other Kens in Barbieland.  

Even though the plot didn’t have a coherent storyline and some of the characters’ dialogue was a little exaggerated, I liked it anyway. One of my favorite things about the Barbie movie was the scenery and music presented in the film. The scenery was very colorful and immersive, and watching it felt like stepping into Barbie’s world. Besides the scenery, I really enjoyed the two musical numbers presented in the film. The music played into the exaggerated nature of the film and allowed anyone who watched “Barbie” to escape reality for a few hours while watching the film. 

Moving away from Barbieland, I was also able see the film, “Oppenheimer” on my actual twenty-third birthday. Now, I must admit that I was a lot more excited to see “Oppenheimer” than “Barbie” when the duo came out on the same day. As a person who likes to watch biopics and historical dramas, I couldn’t wait to walk into that theater and see this movie.  

Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” tells the story of American physicist, J. Robert Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy) and his role as not only the “Father of the Atomic Bomb” but also his time as the sheriff and leader of the Manhattan Project in Los Alamos, New Mexico. 

As a unique way to illustrate two different points in time, Nolan uses black and white to illustrate what Americans would have seen in during the actual hearings, while he also used color to illustrate his life and the development of the atomic bomb.  

One of the things that makes this film phenomenal is the fact that the atomic bomb isn’t just a prop used to illustrate what happened in American history, but it acts to bring the audience into history through its science, sound, and light exposure to show the lasting effects the atomic bomb worldwide. While sitting in the dark theatre and waiting for the bomb to go off, I jumped in my chair at the sounds that shook the entire theatre room.  

Both “Oppenheimer” and “Barbie” have A-list and scripts, which has produced a great summer of movies and time for movie enthusiasts everywhere. Over the past decade, the movie industry had been trampled by a pandemic, a move to online streaming, and a WGA Strike that has caused the culture of sitting in a movie theater to go nearly extinct. Even though the movie industry has a long way to go to return to the record-breaking high of Barbenheimer weekend, the world can safely say that cinema is safe for the time being.