•  ‘Blonde’ has drawn criticism for leaving out important facts from Marilyn Monroe’s life.
• Including her struggle with endometriosis.
• Director Andrew Dominik even called the film ‘salacious’.

“Blonde”, a Netflix film, has drawn criticism for leaving out important facts from Marilyn Monroe’s life, including her struggle with endometriosis.

The film is a reimagining of the same-titled novel by author Joyce Carol Oates, published in 2000. The film received a lot of criticism after its initial screening at the Venice Film Festival.

“scenes in Blonde [are] said to be sexist, exploitative and invasive (with rape, forced abortion and abuse featuring throughout), the pain endured in her short life is being pored over for entertainment purposes again. In fact, director Andrew Dominik even called the film ‘salacious’, adding he wasn’t ‘concerned with being tasteful’ when depicting Monroe’s life,” according to Cosmopolitan.

Helen Wilson-Beevers said that the portrayal of Monroe in the film was not favourable in her review of it for the magazine, “But in addition to the much-loved star’s glamorous signature style and inimitable features, people have also long since been fixated with Monroe’s suffering. She also remains objectified 60 years after her premature death.”

Beevers also brought up a crucial point that had been utterly overlooked. “There is also one hugely significant detail which is regularly overlooked when talking about Monroe. This is that she is believed to have lived with severe endometriosis.”

Beever continued by saying that given the medical condition Monroe had at the time, she would have been subjected to even more primitive treatment.

The actress would have been traumatised by the medical misogyny and the physical and psychological suffering caused by the disease because she was always in the public eye.

she asks the readers, “…isn’t it about time we offered Monroe some respect and validation when it comes to the psychological impact of her traumatic medical history?”

The author concludes, “Marilyn Monroe’s image is inextricably linked with pop culture and perhaps that’s why so many have tried to take a figurative piece of her.

But when doing that, we must recognise the extent of her lived reality. We owe this empathy and care both to the memory of Monroe and the millions of other women with endometriosis who are unwittingly emulating that painful part of the star’s life.”

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