Planned Parenthood is speaking out against the Marilyn Monroe film Blonde for showing two graphic forced abortion scenes and a CGI baby asking, “you won’t hurt me this time, will you?”
Planned Parenthood has called the film “anti-abortion propaganda.”
In one scene, Ana de Armas, who plays Monroe, is seen talking to her baby.
I cannot stop thinking about this vomitous scene from Blonde. Andrew Dominik didn’t even try to conceal his anti-choice views and hatred for Marilyn pic.twitter.com/BJ5OFqkClz
— MAN HATING DYKE (@LadieLabrys) September 30, 2022
In a statement to the Hollywood Reporter, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood said that the “medically inaccurate descriptions of fetuses” contributes to “abortion stigma.”
“As film and TV shapes many people’s understanding of sexual and reproductive health, it’s critical these depictions accurately portray women’s real decisions and experiences,” Caren Spruch, Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s national director of arts and entertainment engagement, told The Hollywood Reporter. “While abortion is safe, essential health care, anti-abortion zealots have long contributed to abortion stigma by using medically inaccurate descriptions of fetuses and pregnancy. Andrew Dominik’s new film, Blonde, bolsters their message with a CGI-talking fetus, depicted to look like a fully formed baby.”
Spruch continued, “Planned Parenthood respects artistic license and freedom. However, false images only serve to reinforce misinformation and perpetuate stigma around sexual and reproductive health care. Every pregnancy outcome — especially abortion — should be portrayed sensitively, authentically and accurately in the media. We still have much work to do to ensure that everyone who has an abortion can see themselves onscreen. It is a shame that the creators of Blonde chose to contribute to anti-abortion propaganda and stigmatize people’s health care decisions instead.”
The film’s writer and director Andrew Dominik remains unapologetic about the scenes.
“What the movie is saying is she’s not seeing reality. She’s seeing her own fears and desires projected onto the world around her,” Dominik told The Wrap. “You see it constantly time and again that she’s reacting to a story that she’s carrying inside her. And I think sort of this desire to look at ‘Blonde’ through this Roe v. Wade lens is everybody else doing the same thing. They’ve got a certain agenda where they feel like the freedoms of women are being compromised, and they look at ‘Blonde’ and they see a demon, but it’s not really about that. I think it’s very difficult for people to step outside of the stories they carry inside themselves and see things of their own volition. And I think that’s really what the movie is about. The dangers of that. But you know, it’s difficult for people to be able to hold two things in their mind at once. It’s either black or white.”
“People are obviously concerned with losses of freedoms,” Dominik continued. “But, I mean, no one would have given a shit about that if I’d made the movie in 2008, and probably no one’s going to care about it in four years’ time. And the movie won’t have changed. It’s just what’s sort of going on.”
