Netflix’s Blonde: What’s wrong with it?

The new Blonde, Netflix movie, made everyone speechless, but not in the way one would think. 

    The ‘Blonde’ movie directed by Andrew Dominik, is about a fictionalized take on the life and career of American actress Marilyn Monroe. It is based on the 2000s Novel, Blonde, by Joyce Carol Oates. The book goes on to talk about very controversial topics; for example, abortion, sexual assault and the story sexualizes and fetishes female pain.  

   The movie has received a lot of backlash for these topics. Model and author Emily Ratajkowski said this on her TikTok, “So I’ve been hearing a lot about this Marilyn Monroe movie “Blonde,’ which I haven’t seen yet, but I’m not surprised to hear it’s yet another movie fetishizing female pain, even in death.” The movie shows the pain and misery Marilyn or Norma Jean had to go through growing up and becoming Marilyn Monroe.  

  Even historian Michelle Vogel, author of Marilyn Monroe: Her Films, Her Life” had said “Marilyn Monroe’s life needs no fictional embellishment,” Vogel says. “It was rags to riches, triumph and tragedy… She was exploited in life, and far more so in death.”  

The movie is more focused on sexual topics then how she rose to fame. It doesn’t even mention Marilyn’s best accomplishments. It just skims over most of them and shows her more painful experiences. 

   Another of the major problems with the Netflix movie, was its Anti-abortion propaganda. “It is a shame that the creators of Blonde chose to contribute to anti-abortion propaganda and stigmatize people’s health care decisions instead,” said Caren Spruce, Planned Parenthood’s Director of Arts and Entertainment engagement. 

 One tragic scene is when Norajean she changes her mind during an abortion procedure. She yells but no one listened to her. Another awful scene was when Norajean had talked to her “baby”, the baby begged her to spare its life. Viewers found this scene too hard to watch.

  The director of Blonde, had actually commented on the backlash that the Movie had received. Andrew Dominik, the director of Blonde, said “That stuff is not really what the film is about,” he said.  “It’s a demanding movie. If the audience doesn’t like it, that’s [the]audience’s problem. It’s not running for public office.”