Blonde (2022) review

Fictionalized biopic (based on the novel by Joyce Carol Oates) about the life of screen legend Norma Jeane Mortenson, better known as Marilyn Monroe (played by Lily Fisher as a child, Ana de Armas as an adult), starting with her younger years being "raised" by her paranoid schizophrenic Mother (Julianne Nicholson) - who tried to drown her - to her beginnings in Hollywood, getting a contract from the predatory Darryl F. Zanuck (David Warshofsky), having a ménage à trois with the sons of Charles Chaplin and Edward G. Robinson (Xavier Samuel and Evan Williams), marrying a former baseball star and a playwright (Bobby Cannavale and Adrien Brody) ... and then becoming the plaything of JFK (Caspar Phillipson).  A good portion of the criticism surrounding this seems to target Dominik for "exploiting" the long-gone actress, but I really do think he had the best intentions ... but he can't help but reduce her to Father Issues (she calls both her husbands "Daddy") and couldn't keep his "creative impulses" under any sort of control and tries to make it "artsy" (lens flare! 16:9!  4:3! distorted lenses! slow motion! black and white! color!).  You can't blame the movie's problems on De Armas - who is luminous - but she's also asked to play every single scene like she's having a nervous breakdown (I'm not joking: count how many times she's shown crying); the rest of the cast holds their own as well (Brody and Cannavale stand out with their limited screentime).  The three hour running time goes by relatively quickly - her 36 years on Earth were busy - but the indulgences become tiresome after a while: I'm no prude, but the blowjob scene is completely unnecessary ... same goes with the "Conversations with Fetuses."