Trigger warning: This article discusses a scene from ‘blonde’ which features rape and violence.
As I begrudgingly switched-on Andrew Dominik’s Marilyn Monroe Biopic ‘Blonde’ I hoped the film was not another creepy exploration of Monroe’s sex life. Too good to be true, of course. The adaptation of Joyce Carol Oates novel which offers a fictionalised account of Monroe’s life focuses on her traumatic childhood, problematic relationship with men and her glamorous yet troubling experience of fame. Despite it being framed as an exploration of her mind, it tends to perpetuate the grotesque stereotypes which exist.
After the short prelude where we are introduced to the little girl Norma Jean and her mentally unstable mother Gladys it does not take long until, after a short time modelling for Cheesecake, Marilyn Monroe is put on her hand and knees and is raped by Mr Z, which consequently leads to her breakthrough into Hollywood. Thereafter, the audience have softcore porn thrusted upon them unwillingly numerous times. Two particularly disturbing scenes include a long close-up of Marilyn’s face while participating in a threesome with two young men implied to be Charlie Chaplin Jr and Eddie Robinson Jr. The scene lasts for three minutes and it felt just that many too long. The arguably most obscene scene out of the two was when JFK pushes Marilyn’s head down towards his lap after she un-enthuastically tugs at his groin. Again, Dominik chooses to use a close up of Marilyn’s head bobbing up and down with an occasional flash of flesh which one can only assume to be the late president’s penis. Dominik had an opportunity to re-imagine the ever-glamorous image of Monroe that we hold in our popular imagination as a tragic sex symbol. Instead, he offers us nothing new and paints the 2D image which we have been shown again and again. Richard Dyer states Monroe falls under the archetype of ‘The Girl’ which is defined solely by three core factors: age, gender and sexual appeal. He states, ‘She is knitted into the fabric of the film through point-of-view shots located in male characters… she is set up as an object of the male sexual gaze’ The close ups of Monroe’s head in the sex scenes are situated in a point-of-view shot which eerily mirrors a popular shot within the pornography industry and thus fails to bring anything new to her story just simply placing her for the thousandth time into the male gaze.
Although, I do not disagree that Monroe was exploited and treated horribly by men in her life but the close focus on her sex life felt nothing but degrading. The film failed to delve beyond the sensationalised ‘troubled’ sex symbol and Dominik seemed far more interested in Monroe’s sexual endeavours than the complexities of a smart and successful actress and businesswoman that despite her hardships achieved a mass amount in the thirty-six years she walked this planet. It was disappointing that her intelligence was only nudged at a few times in her reference to Checkov. Monroe was represented as a historic version of the ‘The Internet Sad Girl’ which arose in the early 2010s Tumblr period. The Internet Sad Girl aesthetic typically includes images of young white attractive girls smoking with plump lips in vintage hues that coincide with captions of Lana Del Rey lyrics. They are girls who ache for somebody to love them, generally mentally unstable and consistently get treated terribly by men but still goes back to them. I see a lot of cross over with the film’s depiction of Monroe and her mental decline. With continuous shots of Monroe, screaming, crying, smoking, drinking and taking pills. The film failed to note her achievements that indicate there was a lot more to Monroe than being a sexually objectified ‘sad girl’ like the fact that she had her own production company, Marilyn Monroe Productions.
I do give credit to the production value of Blonde, the film is beautifully shot. The black and white scenes are particularly stunning. The accurate recreations of her films such as Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and The Seven Year Itch are also something to applaud. However, the continuity of tone was broken by the animated talking foetus that was suddenly sprung upon the viewer. The foetus speaks to Monroe stating, ‘Mummy you’re not going to kill me again like last time.’ Just as I thought the film couldn’t get worse it goes from pornographic to anti-abortion propaganda. In a later scene the abortion scene is replayed but this time the camera literally travels up her vagina… Dominik’s intentions are clear, he just wants to see Marilyn Monroe’s vagina. Although I don’t think he needed to make a nearly 3-hour long film to do so. It’s safe to assume that Hollywood isn’t quite done with exploiting Monroe. In fact, they have taken it to new heights and dressed it up as a deep exploration of her mind. It’s a no from me.