My Week With Marilyn (2011)

Why I Liked... My Week With Marilyn (2011)

(Dir. Simon Curtis Starring: Michelle Williams, Kenneth Branagh, Eddie Redmayne)

They kept the narration to an absolute minimum.

Yes, the film is based on Colin’s (Redmayne) diaries of his time actually spent with Marilyn (though I remain in doubt), but they kept his narration of his time with her at an absolute minimum. Thank god for small favours. Because he was a fairly...generic and repulsive character to me.

Probably because I’ve worked on sets and have known 3rd ADs (though I’m sure there are differences between Canadian AD work and UK AD work), and he was just abusing his power in the worst possible way. Then again, this was an age where women were still treated like crap or objects-and in the film business, women still are treated like crap or objects, but this Colin Clark kid just grated on my nerves.

Michelle Williams’ portrayal of Marilyn was so delicate, a little erratic. Not in the way of her slipping out of character, but as someone who remains a bit of an enigma in heels, I really enjoyed this representation of the iconic blonde. She was calculated and scared and doubtful all at the same time. She seemed to crave love and affection, but was wary of it as well, never trusting those who claimed their love for her. She was ready to be undressed for her public, but never naked.

Oh, you know what I mean.

I’m also morbidly happy that they included a brief mention of her miscarriage during filming. And I’m fine with the brevity of it due to the film being from Colin’s point of view, who didn’t really know much about the woman he was minding at all. Also, I kinda got a little choked up when she uttered that line about how little girls should be told they’re beautiful. That’s what made Williams into Monroe for me, that one line.

A problem I had with the film was that maybe it was a little too sympathetic to Marilyn and her mental woes. Yes, she is vulnerable and is sorry for the time she takes up during filming, but since this is, again, a POV film, we only get to feel what Colin feels during his time on set. I much preferred Sir Laurence Olivier’s (Branagh) anger and raging soliloquies to calm himself down. This was not the woman he wanted to work with. This was not what he wanted to do to his career, because The Prince and the Show Girl (known as The Sleeping Prince in the film’s setting) really wasn’t what he wanted it to end up being. It wasn’t light or fun or romantic, and even before I read about the behind the scenes, I found myself incredulous at Olivier’s character falling in love with this show girl Elsie (but that’s another review), because like Olivier states in the film, he just didn’t quite deliver while waiting for Marilyn to get her lines right. You can’t hit the mark every time, especially when you’re working with someone in Method.

Overall, I really enjoyed the film, despite the fact that I disliked Colin Clark for the majority of it-he’s young, we’ve seen that he gets what he wants, and instantly becoming a 3rd AD right off the mark means there’s a lot of power going to his head (oh yes...believe me, 3rds are pretty...pretty rough sometimes), AND he’s pretty much able to flip the finger at his family who thought what he wanted to do in life was a complete folly. Which is why I so enjoyed his ending in this film. It felt truthful.

But again, because it’s coming from him and his own recollections, I’m still wary of how romanticised it all really was. In hindsight I should have gone into this film just thinking it pure fiction. Or the title card should have said it was ‘based on a true story’, and not have it be ‘a true story’. That just completely threw me off.