BINGHAMTON, NY— Campus couple Sophie Moor and Stew Dent have official broken up amidst allegations that he did not enjoy the Barbie movie directed by Greta Gerwig and starring Margot Robbie. The two were seen attending a university-held screening of the movie on November 3rd. Moviegoers in the Union reported that Stew Dent appeared to be very shaken up by the film’s conclusion and was seen rocking back and forth in his chair, begging his girlfriend to tell him that the movie was finally over and that they could get out of there. News of their split comes at a time when the Barbie film has seen a rise in prominence as a “litmus test” women have been using to gauge their boyfriends’ stances on gender issues. When asked about the extent to which Barbie has been influencing the nature of contemporary heterosexual relationships, social scientist Dr. D. Zaster had this to say: “It’s ultimately easier to indirectly use pop-culture and media as a conduit than to outright discuss these issues with your partner. That is, unless if your relationship is in a healthy place.” Evidently, there has been a sharp spike in women who cite “disagreements over Barbie” as the highest factor in ending their relationships, and the ex-partnership between Moor and Dent stands among these statistics.
Stew Dent had reportedly expressed a multitude of gripes he had with the film to his now ex-partner, such as how he felt that Ryan Gosling’s Ken should have been dubbed the main character and that Gosling should accordingly have received top billing in all promotional material. Dent further elaborated that the male-led Kendom society actualized halfway through the movie, where Barbies all served Kens beers in maids’ outfits, seemed “not that bad,” and went on further to describe it as “actually based.” He also felt that the film’s direction might have been improved had lead actress Robbie been given the space to let her character “smile more”.
Sophie Moor on the other hand viewed Robbie and Gerwig's efforts to explore gender roles in Western society in a much more positive light, and had hoped her boyfriend would have enjoyed the movie as much as she did. Moor explained that she saw aspects of the movie that dealt with both male and female issues, and that the movie was not meant to exclude males, like her boyfriend, from watching it. Moor gives insight into her perspective during the fights she had with her boyfriend over the film: “Like sixty times, I’ve tried to explain men’s issues to my boyfriend and how Barbie, in this woman’s eyes, so capably tackles them— but he just wouldn’t listen.”
Famed and revered director Quentin Tarantino, meanwhile, had this to say about the Barbie movie: “The opening sequence had me hooked. Then Margot put her shoes on. I left the theater soon after.”
In response to the advent of the Barbie movie as a “litmus test” an anonymous male student created a Google Poll where he and other young men attending Binghamton could brainstorm a comparable film or other kind of media that could be adopted into a male equivalent. The media that ranked the highest in the poll were “The Sopranos,” “Taxi Driver,” and “American Psycho.” Men who use these films as litmus tests hope that their girlfriends understand why the main characters in these properties would be “[themselves] for real.”
At press time, Christopher Nolan had been spotted comforting broken-hearted boyfriends in the Union and lamenting that they would have been better off seeing his movie instead.