MY WEEK WITH MARILYN

 Written by Adrian Hodges

Directed by Simon Curtis

Starring Michelle Williams, Eddie Redmayne, Kenneth Branagh and Judi Dench

Marilyn Monroe: All people see is Marilyn Monroe. As soon as they realize I'm not her, they run away.

In 1956, one of the biggest stars and sex symbols the world has ever known travelled to England to make a movie with one of the world’s most respected stage actors. Somewhere in the middle of the inevitable chaos and drama that ensued, a young man named Colin Clark was embarking on his first job in the movie business. The star was Marilyn Monroe; the actor was Sir Laurence Olivier; and the movie was THE PRINCE AND THE SHOWGIRL. Clark’s budding film career never took off but his unique experience would one day become a book (“The Prince, the Showgirl and Me”), which in turn has now become a movie called, MY WEEK WITH MARILYN.

The shoot itself actually went several weeks long but when it comes to spending time with Monroe, the experience is so fleeting that it can feel like an instant that has ended long before it should. There was nothing Clark, portrayed here by fresh faced, Eddie Redmayne, could have done to prepare himself for the magnitude of Monroe’s magnetism. And as the splendid Michelle Williams demonstrates with her finely nuanced performance, there was very little Monroe could do to tame that pull either. Though Clark is just a glorified gopher on set, his innocence and honesty grab Monroe’s attention and before long she latches on to him to use as a shield from the multitude of things that frighten her in general. Her near crippling fear and anxiety in turn threatens the success of the shoot, which causes a serious rift with Sir Laurence, who is played with great exuberance by Kenneth Branagh.

Director, Simon Curtis and writer, Adrian Hodges, both relative unknowns in the world of Hollywood feature filmmaking, infuse MY WEEK WITH MARILYN with a delicate subtlety that allows for simple but sympathetic insight into the mind of the infamous starlet. Bolstered by the almost always brilliant Williams, Monroe comes across here as part frightened little girl, lost in a world she barely understands and part experienced woman, aware of her position and unafraid of abusing her power if it means alleviating her own distress temporarily. She enjoys the attention but also doesn’t know what to do with it when she has it. Most importantly, she is aware that she is more commodity now than person, yet seems more or less content to play along. This might perhaps be because she has no idea how to change the direction of her life or it might be because she no longer remembers who the real Marilyn is anymore.

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BLUE VALENTINE

Written by Derek Cianfrance, Joey Curtis and Cami Delavigne

Directed by Derek Cianfrance

Starring Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams

Cindy: How do you trust your feelings when they can just disappear like that?

Gramma: I think the only way to find out is to have those feelings.

When they say, “For better of for worse,” in wedding vows, I believe they are referring to BLUE VALENTINE in regards to the worse part. Novice feature filmmaker, Derek Cianfrance’s latest is a very particular snapshot of a very specific place in a relationship that far too many people know far too well. And only few of those people live to tell the tale with their wits still about them. In reality, this space is an incredibly difficult test of the mind, the spirit and the heart and every effort is usually made to avoid getting there. It is one of the darkest stages a relationship can reach but Cianfrance is not the least bit afraid of the dark.

Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams, an indie dream couple if I’ve ever heard one before, are Dean and Cindy, a young couple with a little girl, living their married life in rural Pennsylvania. They have been together for six years but those years have been far from kind. At the moment we meet them, Dean is feeding his daughter breakfast while Cindy is getting ready for work – an ordinary morning for many a couple, I’m sure. The difference here is that this kitchen is weighted down with a crushing tension that is evident in every look given and every word spoken. She seems appalled by his every action and influence over their daughter and he seems to know it. The room is rotten with the stench of hatred.

Dean and Cindy know they don’t have much time left and decide to get a room at a cheap motel in New York City for the night in hopes of working through their issues and rekindling their romance. Their intentions are sincere but the fight is so insurmountable at times, they each struggle with their resolve. Gosling, while somewhat overwrought in his character’s intensity, must be commended for the amount of evident effort he made to make Dean real and not just a bad husband. That said, Williams is heartbreaking every moment she is on screen. Even the manner in which she clasps her fists during one of the film’s many sexual moments is emotionally devastating. Together, they genuinely feel like two people who have been oscillating between love and hate for years, so much so that it can be too much to take at times.

Cianfrance is a brave man for going to as many places of despair in BLUE VALENTINE as he does but he’s not stupid. He knows that an audience needs to breathe so he tells the entire story of their relationship in moments so that we can see that there once was a time when these two knew happiness, that there is another reason other than their daughter that they are fighting to stay together. The device is somewhat manipulative at times as its obvious point is to make us feel even worse that their relationship doesn’t seem to be salvageable. BLUE VALENTINE did make me feel pretty bad. I had been in some variation of that relationship in my life and it was hard enough to deal with then so, as fantastic as the film is in its most candid moments, I’m not sure everyone is ready to go back there again.

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SHUTTER ISLAND

Written by Laeta Kalogridis
Directed by Martin Scorcese
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Michelle Williams, Emily Mortimer and Ben Kingsley


Warden: If I were to sink my teeth into your eye right now, would you be able to stop me before going blind?

From the moment this ominous ferry emerges from the thick fog to bring Federal Marshalls, Teddy Daniels and Chuck Aule (Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo) to Shutter Island in the opening shots of legendary director, Martin Scorcese’s SHUTTER ISLAND, you know you’re about to watch a masterful movie made by a mindful man. It is instantly and unavoidably intriguing and it isn’t long after the boat docks that you realize you have as little chance of getting off this island as everyone else there, at least not with your wits about you.


Teddy and Chuck are on assignment to investigate a missing prisoner, I mean, patient, on Shutter Island. The mistake and the correction are made a number of times in the film as it is simply never really clear whether Shutter Island is a correctional facility or a mental facility. Whether there even should be a distinction for these particular prisoner-patients is up for debate just like the intentions of every character we meet on this island. Scorcese makes it so every man on the island is out for himself; even Teddy and Chuck just met as new partners on the ferry over. Subsequently, paranoia and mistrust run rampant in everyone’s mind and each day becomes a balancing act with each person’s personal sanity walking a very tight rope.


SHUTTER ISLAND takes place in 1954, when applied psychology was at a distinct crossroads between older, more barbaric means of treatment and more modern prescription methods to dealing with madness. One of the head doctors on Shutter Island, Dr. Cawley (Ben Kingsley) claims to not subscribe to either school of thought in favour of a more sympathetic approach that relies on the belief that it is actually possible to get through to the mind of a mad man. Despite this, he will not allow Teddy and Chuck to enter the heavily-guarded Ward C, where only the most dangerous, uh, patients are housed. This lack of full disclosure makes it hard to imagine that everything happening on this island is happening according to protocol. Perhaps it is but then what is the established island protocol anyway?


It becomes clear to Teddy that his time on Shutter Island is not meant to be limited to just this investigation. A case is being built against him to show him as just as crazy as every other patient there, effectively silencing any evidence he uncovers in his investigation. But while it may be clear to Teddy, it becomes pretty clear to the audience that nothing on Shutter Island is as it seems. What is the truth and who is actually telling it? Better yet, will we even believe it when we hear it? The answers do come and they are as unsettling as every other moment in this tight two and a half hour production.


As it is put forth a few times in SHUTTER ISLAND, to accuse someone of being insane is truly all you need to do to make it a fact. All protest made by the accused will be seen as logical dismissal of the accusation but not a valid argument against it. Scorcese knows the same rational will apply to the way the viewer will see the film, making visiting SHUTTER ISLAND such a deliberate and delicate mind trip. You may even wonder in fact whether you too don’t belong there by the end. This is what makes Scorcese the undisputed winner of his own elaborately designed game.

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