Thumbnail Musings from Newsletter:
Blonde (2022) and the Exploitation of Marilyn Monroe
I generally don't like to write about movies that I don't like, but that's not an absolute and this week I'll try to spin a negative into a positive! Last night I finally got around to watching the recently released Netflix film Blonde, directed by Andrew Dominik (Chopper '00, Killing Them Softly '12). The film is a fictionalized depiction of the life of Marilyn Monroe and presents Monroe's life as a long series of personal tragedies, exploitation and unhappiness, framed by a persistent longing to connect with the father she never knew. Based on the novel of the same name by Joyce Carrol Oates, Blonde is presented in dreamlike episodes that have Monroe struggling between 'Norma' and 'Marilyn,' her dueling personalities and personas. I've not read the book, but it clearly took liberties with Monroe's real life, rumors about her love life and her career. The film also doesn't shy away from creating contact points with famous people that expand upon the known to increase their importance, including a long running threesome with Charles Chaplin,Jr. and Edward Robinson, Jr that ends with Chaplin's death 6 years before it actually happened and his cruel involvement in a hoax related to Monroe's father.
Because the film was touted as having achieved an X-rating, it amplifies sexual encounters that may or may not have taken place, to graphically illustrate Monroe's exploitation at the hands of powerful men, specifically 20th Century Fox studio head Darryl F. Zanuck and President John F. Kennedy. While it certainly is possible, and likely probable, that she had sex with one or both men, the way it is depicted seems solely to create salacious buzz around the film. We get it, she was a victim of a culture that exploited and discarded women daily, but presenting these episodes in the way the film does, seems like that exploitation is pulled forward to include Ana DeArmas, who plays Marilyn. I don't condone the behavior or the culture, but the film makes it worse by repeating it.
My final gripe about the film is that, aside from the tragedies, which there were many and have been well-documented in countless books and programs, the film utilizes nothing more than recreated images from famous Monroe photo shoots to fill in the story. By simplifying her life to a collection of still photographs brought to life offended me because it tries to create context where there was none. It is a cheap shorthand to illicit closeness and familiarity with the character, to Marilyn, but it just comes off as lazy, which is a cardinal sin in my book.
Now for the positive spin. What the film did make me want to do to cleanse my palette was to watch as many Marilyn Movies as I could to re-remind myself what a great performer she was and how her life was cut tragically short. Perhaps, for me, the reason I have The Misfits ('59) as my favorite performance of Marilyn's is the same reason why Blonde was created, we cannot separate Monroe's tragic life from her performances. I prefer to enjoy her performances and remember her tragic life, I just don't need to have the exploitation repeated in another format.
Please take the time to watch your favorite Marilyn Monroe film. Here are my top 10 favorites, as well as a couple of pieces on individual films. If you haven't seem Niagara ('53), it might just blow you away.
Blonde (2022) and the Exploitation of Marilyn Monroe
I generally don't like to write about movies that I don't like, but that's not an absolute and this week I'll try to spin a negative into a positive! Last night I finally got around to watching the recently released Netflix film Blonde, directed by Andrew Dominik (Chopper '00, Killing Them Softly '12). The film is a fictionalized depiction of the life of Marilyn Monroe and presents Monroe's life as a long series of personal tragedies, exploitation and unhappiness, framed by a persistent longing to connect with the father she never knew. Based on the novel of the same name by Joyce Carrol Oates, Blonde is presented in dreamlike episodes that have Monroe struggling between 'Norma' and 'Marilyn,' her dueling personalities and personas. I've not read the book, but it clearly took liberties with Monroe's real life, rumors about her love life and her career. The film also doesn't shy away from creating contact points with famous people that expand upon the known to increase their importance, including a long running threesome with Charles Chaplin,Jr. and Edward Robinson, Jr that ends with Chaplin's death 6 years before it actually happened and his cruel involvement in a hoax related to Monroe's father.
Because the film was touted as having achieved an X-rating, it amplifies sexual encounters that may or may not have taken place, to graphically illustrate Monroe's exploitation at the hands of powerful men, specifically 20th Century Fox studio head Darryl F. Zanuck and President John F. Kennedy. While it certainly is possible, and likely probable, that she had sex with one or both men, the way it is depicted seems solely to create salacious buzz around the film. We get it, she was a victim of a culture that exploited and discarded women daily, but presenting these episodes in the way the film does, seems like that exploitation is pulled forward to include Ana DeArmas, who plays Marilyn. I don't condone the behavior or the culture, but the film makes it worse by repeating it.
My final gripe about the film is that, aside from the tragedies, which there were many and have been well-documented in countless books and programs, the film utilizes nothing more than recreated images from famous Monroe photo shoots to fill in the story. By simplifying her life to a collection of still photographs brought to life offended me because it tries to create context where there was none. It is a cheap shorthand to illicit closeness and familiarity with the character, to Marilyn, but it just comes off as lazy, which is a cardinal sin in my book.
Now for the positive spin. What the film did make me want to do to cleanse my palette was to watch as many Marilyn Movies as I could to re-remind myself what a great performer she was and how her life was cut tragically short. Perhaps, for me, the reason I have The Misfits ('59) as my favorite performance of Marilyn's is the same reason why Blonde was created, we cannot separate Monroe's tragic life from her performances. I prefer to enjoy her performances and remember her tragic life, I just don't need to have the exploitation repeated in another format.
Please take the time to watch your favorite Marilyn Monroe film. Here are my top 10 favorites, as well as a couple of pieces on individual films. If you haven't seem Niagara ('53), it might just blow you away.
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