Ana de Armas Can't Understand Why Her Marilyn Monroe Movie Got an NC-17 Rating
Call me old fashioned, call me what you will. But I personally long for a time when there were certain things my America did better than any other country. Build machines. Make music. Win wars. And make movies. But not just any movies. Movies with gratuitous nudity.
Sure, there may have been a time back in the 1950s and early '60s when in order to see impossibly attractive naked people on screen our forefathers would have to go watch some pretentious art house cinema verite' from France or Sweden. But by the Vietnam era, the nation cast aside the yoke of the pro-censorship scolds and brought some much needed T&A to the mainstream. Every guy in my age demo has a vivid childhood memory of looking out the window of mom's station wagon as she motored up the highway past a Drive-In theater and glimpsing a 60-foot high butt shot on the big screen. It was our version of finding pirate treasure. We still share the stories amongst ourselves, like the survivors of some great adventure. If you know, then you know.
That proud tradition of fun, carefree movie nudity lasted up until just about the turn of the century. The 1990s were a gold mine of that sort of thing. Highly entertaining movies with broad appeal like American Pie, Basic Instinct and Wild Things promised nip shots and sometimes full frontal and they delivered on that promise. Careers were built on it. Otherwise obscure actresses became America's It Girl overnight for their willingness to show their funny business.
I don't know what killed that trend, exactly. Whether it was feminists objecting to being objectified, or a return to traditional morals (which there is no other evidence of), or 9/11, but the simply joy of finding your Blockbuster VHS all worn out at one good part from the pervs who had it before you watching, rewinding, and rewatching hundreds of times over just ceased to be. Then by the time Harvey Weinstein and his ilk were exposed for the exploitative, predatory creeps they are, good old harmless raunch was dead as an art form.
Well, if there's one movie star willing to bring back the glory days of on screen nakedness, it's Ana de Armas. Bless her. No one in Hollywood today is more qualified. And there's no one audiences of every sex, race, national origin or sexual preference would rather see fighting this good fight. And it's only appropriate she do it by portraying the most celebrated sex symbol of all time. In an NC-17 film releasing on Netflix, so you won't even have to leave your house to share your shame with a darkened room of strangers.
And with Blonde releasing soon, de Armas is doing a publicity tour where she's saying she doesn't get what the big deal is:
Source - Blonde star Ana de Armas is speaking out against her Marilyn Monroe bio-drama getting an NC-17 rating.
When asked about the rating by French fashion magazine L’Officiel, the actress replied, “I didn’t understand why that happened. I can tell you a number of shows or movies that are way more explicit with a lot more sexual content than Blonde. But to tell this story it is important to show all these moments in Marilyn’s life that made her end up the way that she did. It needed to be explained. Everyone [in the cast] knew we had to go to uncomfortable places. I wasn’t the only one.” ...
Director Andrew Dominik previously predicted the film, which is based on Joyce Carol Oates’ novel, would get an NC-17, defiantly telling Screen Daily in February: “It’s a demanding movie. If the audience doesn’t like it, that’s the fucking audience’s problem. It’s not running for public office. It’s an NC-17 movie about Marilyn Monroe, it’s kind of what you want, right? I want to go and see the NC-17 version of the Marilyn Monroe story.” ...
All the hubbub over the rating has resulted in a considerable amount of global publicity for the film and seems rather unlikely to reduce its viewership.
And that, dear friends, is how you do that. This is Marketing 101. You get one of the world's most attractive women humbling saying she doesn't know what the nudity fuss is all about. The director basically taunting, daring, the censors to slap that adult rating on his project. You keep talking about the rating to generate free publicity that echoes through the internet until the public no longer wants to see your film. They have to see your film. Like if they miss Ana de Armas' sex scenes, their life is forfeit.
Here's hoping it makes everyone involved with it millions. That it makes more than an Avengers or Star Wars movie so Disney will stop recycling those and studios will bring us back to the days of Jamie Lee Curtis freeing the twins in Trading Places or Phoebe Cates climbing out of the pool in slow motion in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. If anyone can restore that former glory, it's real Ana de Armas and fictional Marilyn Monroe. Godspeed to them both.
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