ARTS
“This sensationalisation and subsequent fetishisation of female suffering is prevalent in countless pieces of media.” INDIA BOLAH
This romanticisation/sexualising of female suffering additionally exists beyond the realms of cinema, seeming to permeate many other forms of media; most notably impacting our perception of women whose suffering has been repackaged to be exhibited as mere entertainment. Celebrities like Amy Winehouse, Anna Nicole Smith and Whitney Houston fascinate us: their sorrow is almost magnetic, as an air of tragedy surrounds their personas, making them seem all the more alluring and seductive. Being a sex symbol has seemingly become synonymous with melancholia and emotional trauma, arguably due to the conflation of youth and innocence with femininity. This brings me to the emphasis placed on Marilyn’s relationship (or lack thereof) with her father throughout the film. The absence of a father figure during her childhood proves to render Marilyn emotionally fragile, as she seeks a kind of paternal love through her marriages, almost seeming to regress in maturity in an attempt to heal her inner child. This depiction becomes harmful when combined with the excessive on-screen nudity of Ana De Armas, which seems all the more disturbing when married with explicit displays of physical abuse enacted by Monroe’s first husband: Joe DiMaggio. Marilyn’s torture doesn’t end here though, as audience members are subject to seeing the actress undergo two involuntary abortions; neither of which are confirmed to be historically accurate. Director Dominik goes
on to then delineate a newly pregnant Monroe communicating with a CGI foetus, who begs for its life just moments before she miscarries; almost implying that she is at fault for not carrying the foetus to term. The aforementioned events are accompanied with egregious depictions of sexual abuse, which only serve to further delineate Monroe as an impotent victim and nothing more. In Blonde, she’s reduced to an infantile sex-doll, as Dominik strips Monroe of any and all agency, totally compressing her personhood into a uni-dimensional caricature. This sensationalisation and subsequent fetishisation of female suffering is prevalent in countless pieces of media, largely due to our ingrained socio-political ideas surrounding women and the sanctity of the female form. This brings us to question whether or not female pain can be depicted on screen independent from said beliefs, or whether the perception of women’s suffering as provocative and sexually charged is ultimately inescapable. Should one also take into account the architect of these displays? Can these exhibitions be excused when a woman is responsible for their conception, and is recognising the art’s value in association to its creator’s identity a responsible/ ethical stance to adopt? The subjective nature of this debate leads me to believe that there is, in fact, no way to ensure that women’s suffering can be viewed independent to its sexual connotations by all spectators; however, I do believe that there is significant room for improvement regarding Hollywood’s tactless handling of the subject matter.
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