To start by giving 'Reframed: Marilyn Monroe' some credit, there is a serviciable account of the life of the woman is is arguably still the world's most famous actress buried within this documentary; and it does exactly what it says it does, in asking us to think about her life in a different way. Unfortunately, that means that much of the programme comprises other people telling us what we should think. This new framing is nominally a feminist one, but it goes too far. Firstly, every action she ever took is justified and glorified. Secondly, the case for feminism is mainly how society denies women agency; but if you watch this programme, you would conclude that the problem is actually that society refuses to acknowlege the agency that women actually have (which may also be a problem, but is surely a secondary one). Painting Marilyn as a wholly tragic figure may be misjudged; that doesn't mean that everything she did was a personal triumph. And thirdly, it's a strange sort of feminism that reduces itself to an account of an unusually gifted sister doing for for herself. In spite of sexism, intelligent and beautiful women have always been able to get at least some of what they want; the terrible thing about our society is that mediocre women have generally worse lives than equally mediocre men. Which is not to say that Marilyn's story is not interesting; but I would have prefered to be left to draw my own conclusions, rather than to be told what to think by contemporary commentators relentlessly pushing positivism on me.
