Miss A’s first trip to the Cinema : Barbie in The Princess and the Popstar

Whilst I have been blogging we have been offered some fantastic things to review, and I consider myself and my family to be very lucky.  I think the things that will always stick in my mind as being the most special is when we get to go to events together.  They tend to be one-off things, and absolutely priceless in terms of memories.  We were invited to one such event on Friday. The UK premier of Barbie, Princess and the Popstar.

The day before we had been sent two of the dolls, they were the two key characters in the new Barbie movie The Princess and the Popstar, Keira and Tori.

Normally I would include photographs of items like these in the packaging, but such was the excitement to open these, that I’m afraid I wasn’t able to.  They were well packaged though, with clear instruction booklets included.

The dolls are available to purchase at toy stores such as Argos priced at £24.99 each.

Each of the dolls at first glance looked like a well made standard Barbie doll, but they were so different!  Each transformed into the dolls alter ego! The change was very simple (Miss A aged 3 could do it with ease) but it meant that the outfit and hair colour altered on each of the dolls. For the hair you simply turned the hair around to reveal either pink or purple highlights and either a crown or headband. There is no need to remove these and re attach, as they move with the hair….so simple!

You will notice that each of the dolls has a necklace which once pressed played two different snipets of the songs from the movie. We loved that they played each recording, and didn’t restart if you accidentally pressed the necklace again.

It is the same with the dress, with a quick adjustment of the material, each dolls outfit is transformed.  Even the velcro is easy to attach.  I loved that Miss A was able to achieve this transformation herself, as sometimes toys such as these she can find frustrating and fidley.

The above photographs were taken on the morning that we were off to see the film that the dolls star in.

We were all excited, as we headed off really early in the morning to get a train to Leicester to see the movie.

The Princess and the Popstar Movie was having a one-off premier at all Vue cinemas, just before the general release of the Movie on DVD. I have never been to a Vue cinema, but was really impressed.  It surprised me that they allocated the seating, what a fantastic idea! They also had booster seats available (there was around 30 or so of them) so Miss A and the other shorter boys and girls didn’t miss any of the action!

Here is the synopsis:

Barbie: The Princess and the Popstar is the 26th Barbie movie in the series, based on Mark Twain’s The Prince and the Pauper. Princess Tori is bored with the stuffiness of her royal life and dreams of becoming a popstar, while popstar Keira is tired of being famous and fantasises about one day becoming a princess. When the two meet, they magically swap lives so they can see what it would be like to live their dreams and a life-long friendship is born. Barbie: The Princess and the Popstar is classic wish-fulfillment fantasy fare for the young at heart.

Once we’d settled ourselves with popcorn and a drink, the movie quickly started – no adverts, whoop!  I think the testament to this film and how engaging and watch-able it is, is that this was Miss A’s very first cinema experience and not only did she love it, but she was enthralled by it. She sat through the entire thing, she did ask a couple of questions but she definitely was engrossed with the story and characters.  Sometimes its hard to predict how a child is going to react to a film, but this is definitely suitable for a younger audience.

The cinema, was just over half full, and you could really tell that the children enjoyed it, the giggled and laughed throughout, there was even a point where they were shouting at the bad guy.

We had such a lovely day, I’m sure Miss A will never forget her very first experience of going to the cinema, and neither will I.

I also wanted to let you know that Miss N who is 9 years old,enjoyed it.  She actually thought that the story was the best Barbie film she has ever seen. She thought it felt modern and yet kept the magical elements that Barbie films are famous for, and I agree!

The dolls are available to purchase now, and the DVD is available to pre-order, it is due for release late August.

Thank you for reading

 

 

 

 

Disclaimer: We were given two Barbie dolls and three tickets to the screening of Barbie Princess and the Popstar.  My review here is however 100 % honest.