The much-maligned “Cats” movie musical caused the internet to lose its mind after a visual effects editor on the film confirmed that CGI was used to add buttholes to all of the feline characters. The “butthole cut,” as it became known on social media, was ultimately scrapped by the studio. It’s now been revealed that the upcoming “Barbie” movie flirted with its own potential CGI disaster, as writer-director Greta Gerwig shut down early discussions that would’ve had her actors sporting CGI feet since Barbie is known for her arched heels.
“There was a big discussion in the beginning,” Gerwig said on Australia’s “The Project.” “Everyone said, ‘Are you going to CGI all the feet?’ And I thought, ‘Oh god, no! That’s terrifying! That’s a nightmare.’ Also Margot has the nicest feet. She has these beautiful dancer feet. She should just hang on to that bar and do it just like this.”
The official trailer for “Barbie” begins with a shot of Robbie stepping out of her high-heel slippers to reveal her bare feet are still arched and ready to be slipped into whatever next shoe accessory awaits. Robbie refused to use a foot double for the moment and held on to a bar off camera to stabilize her balance.
As revealed in a recent Time magazine cover story on the making of “Barbie”: “The shot took eight takes. [Margot Robbie] had to hold onto a bar to keep her feet flexed. And, yes, those are her feet. ‘I really don’t like it when someone else does my hands or feet in an insert shot,’ she says.”
Ensuring the Barbie characters had arched feet all went into Gerwig’s plan to capture her own experience with the doll growing up.
“Even though it’s this huge movie, it feels very personal to me,” Gerwig said on “The Project.” “It was made by so many people who cared about it. Even the Barbie logo that we used is the logo that I had as a child of the ’80s. I would stand in the toy store…we had the wide boxes because their hair was really big. I wanted the [logo] that I liked.”
“Barbie” opens in theaters nationwide July 21 from Warner Bros.
