Barbie and Chelsea: The Lost Birthday (2021)
On December 5, 2023 by CrescentBarbie and Chelsea: The Lost Birthday is one of the shortest movies in the entire Barbie cinematic universe… That’s a good thing. I don’t think I would have been able to survive if this movie was much longer than that.
Story
Lost Birthday brings us something new in terms of story. Instead of following an iteration of Barbie, it’s all about Chelsea. While on a cruise ship, Chelsea’s birthdate is missed due to the boat passing over the international date line. Chelsea, disappointed with her lack of a birthday, sets out on a journey through a magical island to find a way to reverse the lost date.
Lost Birthday has a massive pacing problem. This movie feels like it’s struggling to reach the one hour mark, and everything is slow enough to feel like it’s almost holding your hand. Some would argue that to be the point of kids’ media, but I think children are smart enough to not need that, especially with the target demographic for this movie. The story is fine in the first twenty minutes, but after that, it slows down a lot and shuffles along before barely cresting the hour mark. It’s agonizingly slow and doesn’t do much of anything with its time.
This largely comes down to the framing of the story. The adventure on the island is meant to be an interesting, exciting journey… But I found it to be the worst part. The time spent on the ship is much more fun to me, and that doesn’t last anywhere near long enough. The story feels underbaked with so much time dedicated to a poorly executed idea.
The story of Lost Birthday is very poorly paced and struggles to make an impact or reach its full run time.
Story: 2/10
Characters
The characters in Lost Birthday feel fine on their own. All of the Roberts sisters have their regular quirks, and they’re easy enough to differentiate here… But at the same time, their regular quirks feel like part of the problem. This movie is meant to be set in the same world as Dolphin Magic and Princess Adventure, but all of the development or depth to the cast from those movies has been erased. Seeing them reverted back to their most generic of forms feels reductive, and it doesn’t help with the movie’s general struggle to not be shallow.
The animal characters here only drive the point home. They don’t really go through any growth in the movie, and they’re not all that fun to watch either. They’re all inspired by the Roberts sisters, but they irritate me more than anything else. Lacie in particular really grated on me. It was nice seeing them take down the villain, yes, but that’s about all I can say. Arnold is a joyless man, and I wanted to punch him whenever he appeared. Maybe that was the point? I’m not sure.
The main character I enjoyed here was Arlene. She wasn’t around much, but I enjoyed it when she was. She’s just fun. I wish we got to spend more time with her. Maybe it would have made the movie a bit less frustrating.
The characters in Lost Birthday are reductive and boring the whole way through.
Characters: 2/10
World Building
The world building of Lost Birthday is… Confusing. Some of it is meant to be Chelsea’s dream, but it’s hard to figure out what’s real and what’s imagined in the beginning. It takes a while to understand, and once you do get it, it feels like a poor choice. Maybe this is just me, but I’ve never enjoyed the “it was a dream the whole time” twist. It doesn’t really work here either.
The island’s world building feels flimsy too. There are riddles everywhere, but the world doesn’t do much of substance beyond present you with rhymes. It just feels like a generic island. There’s not much of value here. I know it’s meant to be a dream world, but it’s not fun to be in. It’s just boring.
The world in Lost Birthday is poorly defined and uninteresting to watch.
World Building: 1/10
Themes
There’s no specified theme for this movie, and that means I need to come up with something. It’s a lot harder than I would like it to be to come up with something concrete here though. I guess… The theme is that spending your time with family is what matters most. It’s fine enough, but it doesn’t feel all that good of a theme at the same time. It’s decent as a throwaway idea, but it lacks any real substance, especially with how much time is spent with the family divided.
Themes: 2.5/10
Production
Lost Birthday feels like its animation should be a step up from the last few movies. The animation has been on a nice upward climb for years now, so why would it backslide now? Well… The animals exist. I found them incredibly unsettling to look at. Their eyes are massive, and while I know it’s a stylistic choice, it was not one I enjoyed. Lacie in particular looked absolutely atrocious, and I winced whenever she appeared. Why does a monkey need to look so human? The animation is fine if you ignore this, but the animals are around a lot, so you can’t ignore it forever.
Maybe this is just me, but I feel like the voice acting has taken a step back too. There’s a different voice cast here compared to movies like Great Puppy Adventure and Dolphin Magic, and I liked the other one better. I can’t tell if it’s the script or the voice acting itself, but they sound kind of stilted here. I miss the old cast. I don’t think they could have done much better because of the poor script, but I wish they were still here.
Lastly, we have the music. Lost Birthday has a pretty forgettable score, but its one sung number is even worse. I didn’t like it at all, and I wanted it to be over the entire time it was happening. While the song isn’t offensively bad and is definitely a step up from a few particularly bad songs in other movies, I still didn’t like it. Saying it’s a step up isn’t saying much unfortunately.
The production of Lost Birthday was very disappointing, and the animation in particular felt like a step back.
Production: 5/10
Overall
Barbie and Chelsea: The Lost Birthday is a very slow movie that struggles to properly articulate the lines between reality and fantasy. It may only be an hour long, but it drags on for every minute of its run time. Don’t watch this movie. You’ll probably find yourself checking the time bar just as much as I did.
Overall: 2.5/10
Silly Superlative: Barbie movie with the animals with the biggest eyes
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