Great Film overall

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

This is another one of the many Barbie movies made. I'd argue none of them are good, but this one at least wasn't that bad. I actually did like some of the twists. It's actually a story being told by Barbie about her and her friend as other characters who find a magic mirror with a girl imprisoned in it. In the movie, they end up going to a castle they think they want to live in because of a prophecy. It's actually revealed that this prophecy is fake. Also, they decide not to stay in the diamond castle in the end, which I actually liked. I thought that told a good message.I guess the animation wasn't the best or worst. I did think it was better than some used in the other films but it did look off many times. I especially was turned off by the dragon. He was actually kind of well written too. Still, it was kind of boring and it probably would have worked better as a long episode of a Barbie TV show. For Barbie fans, I would in fact recommend it, as it's nothing too memorable. It is at least better than you would think. **1/2

I admit I do enjoy most of the Barbie movies, though none are among my favourite movies. Of the lot, my personal favourite is Nutcracker, but Diamond Castle is my second favourite. The animation here is among the best-looking of any of the Barbie movies, colourful and wondrous. The music is very catchy, any movie does its job well if you remember or love the music, and while Nutcracker, Rapunzel and Swan Lake have music that is more to my personal taste, Diamond Castle does its job well indeed in this respect. The dialogue is good, not too corny, and the story is cute, has a lot of heart and while there is a dark centre it is not too dark. I love the characters, especially the twins and Slyder, and the voice work is solid from all, Kelly Sheridan and Scott McNeil impress me every time I hear them. In conclusion, I really like this movie, given a chance without prejudice you may like it too. 9/10 Bethany Cox

When I first started with Barbie DVDs it was the My Scene collection and I found the music to be really okay but the stories to have too much of gritty mid teen personalities than I could easily cope with back then. England was having a pogrom against some of the dispossessed and we did tend to get a lot of grit, a maybe for why the occasional hypersensitivity. The last couple of years I have been noticing a lot of grit and hypersensitivity on the IMDb user pages. At other places in England too.Easter 2010 I could not find a Barbie Easter egg but what I did have instead was three more Barbie DVDs. As well as Diamond Castle (2008) I also had Rapunzel (2002) and Swan Lake (2003). Music is a strong part of these, too, but it is nothing like My Scene. I started by preferring all of these stories but having qualms about the music in all but Swan Lake.Second viewing, with Barbie DVDs I do watch them more than once, I was still having qualms with the music in Rapunzel but could really like the others. So, here are two more Barbie DVDs, Diamond Castle and Swan Lake, and I could really like both the stories and the music.With Rapunzel, I wonder if the problem is symbolic. I sort of like the story of Rapunzel, a Barbie like girl trapped by a wicked witch but managing to eventually break free. Smooth and nice, if leaving the witch trapped in everlasting hell. Just if anyone knows the classical music that much of the background music uses, Dvorak's New World Symphony, would they be likely to be considering the music as a weak sham, too? Most age 5ish should not have that sort of problem so they just might like this a lot. The other IMDb user reviews that mention the music appear to like it too. The music is played well and fits rather well but if one knows the way that Dvorak used this stuff then is this missing out, a repetitive chunk of nice instead of the proper musical story that Dvorak wrote? Symbolic new world? This qualm will likely appear as unreal to many, but it does have me heading back to listen to the proper music and not bothering with the DVD all that much. A sort of grit that most all will not notice as real at all? But Diamond Castle and Swan Lake. I could not find a Barbie Easter egg, I had to put up with a HSM and a choc bunny instead, but what I found was way better. Oh yeah these are nice.

For being a Barbie movie, I enjoyed watching this with my girls far more than I expected. I liked the characters quite a bit, especially the twins. The storyline was fun and as usual, the good lesson. The graphics weren't bad, the music though a tad bit shrill at times with the singing, isn't bad either though beware, they're catchy enough tunes that they get stuck in your head... like a commercial jingle. I find myself humming "Connected" and then laughing at the fact that I'm humming my daughter's movie song. My three year old is entranced with the movie, she loves the puppies. So far, out of the barbie movies I have been bullied with big blue eyes and sweet smiles into watching, this one is my favorite.