After several years without a feature film, Andrew Dominik re-enters the film industry with a bang with his controversial Netflix production. Released Wednesday September 28 on the platform, Blonde, a fictional biopic, adapted from the novel of the same name by Joyce Carol Oates, tells the story of an alternative, fictionalized life of Marilyn Monroe. A dramatic portrait that borders on the fantastic and encounters scandal.
The film follows the life of Norman Jeane, better known as Marilyn Monroe. From her sad childhood to her tragic death, the director shows the actress' rapid descent into hell. This retelling of the American icon's life focuses on the heavy media coverage and objectification to which Monroe was subjected, giving rise to profound psychological suffering.
A mesmerizing face
In addition to Andrew Dominik's unique blend of historical fact and pure invention, the film plays with the different levels of reality within the diegesis. The contrast between Marilyn's daily life (Ana de Armas) and the numerous accesses to her tormented conscience are manifested in more or less welcome ways. Although we understand the rather obvious metaphor of real life versus cinema (a vaporous opposition in the case of Marilyn Monroe), the desire to alternate color and black-and-white sequences remains a little gratuitous, as do other winks such as the fades to black and the square image format.
Forward tracking shots and close-ups of the pin-up work very well indeed. In fact, these shots are the film's greatest asset. The actress, very often framed in the center of the picture and always anchored in a certain fixity, hypnotizes us with her acting, her gaze and her expressions, recalling the way the camera filmed female stars in the golden age of the studios. This proximity allows Monroe's emotions to be captured more deeply, accentuating the film's introspective character.
While the staging and framing give careful access to the actress's interiority, this very interiority is sometimes very unsettling. Scenes of reverie that flirt with the fantastic sometimes give the viewer the impression of dealing with a frankly disturbed character. From the outset, the emphasis on the potential internal dissociation between Norma Jeane and Marilyn Monroe suggests a heroine more demented than melancholy. Without having to indicate this to us through frightening and very explicit scenes, we would have understood that this psychotic delirium is a survival strategy for the star in the face of her success.
A make-or-break aesthetic choice
In the same vein, certain shots and camera movements constitute extremely crude scenes, sometimes in bad taste. Clearly, these images are disturbing, and it's understandable that the film's tone can be off-putting. But it is around this brutality that one of the main plots of the story takes shape. These moments testify to Marilyn's lack of choice, a victim of her beauty, her presence and all the effervescence that goes with it.
Let's not dwell on the scenes in which Monroe is reduced to a sexual object. Let's simply note that the script presents three relationships with distinct profiles. While it seems that the star regains a taste for life within her relationships, finally freed from solitude, the director gradually reveals the influence of these lovers. They all seem to lock the star into a role that suits their expectations, and by extension those of Marilyn's audience. Beyond these three imposed versions of Norma Jeane's celebrity, some of the wide shots of the crowd admirably convey the sense of suffocation that Ana de Armas sometimes succeeds in expressing, sometimes in concealing.
As a whole, the film is anchored in a very dark atmosphere that contrasts with the usual Marilyn Monroe image, shattering the myth and exposing a very obscure part of her life. This point of view is a singular choice, but at least the film stays true to it from start to finish. Prepare to be shaken up a bit.
Write to the author: leila.favre@leregardlibre.com
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Blonde Matt Kennedy Netflix
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