Marilyn
As a viewer it is difficult to connect with Marilyn as a person due to the completely different lifestyle that we have. They are two highly contrasting worlds as they come from very different backgrounds with Marilyn having a very dark and troubled childhood and because of this coming into adulthood was very difficult for her and this means that she’s a troubled soul now. However Colin comes from a very loving and supportive home with this they highly contrast. Because of this it’s very difficult to share empathy with her as I have no clue on the emotions and the extent of them she went through.
Also Marilyn is not just your “average” person she is idolised and adored by the many, she is far from normality and is caught up in a world of showbiz, once again because of this vast difference of career and lifestyle it’s hard to connect with how she feels about it all and due to this it’s incredibly difficult to engage with her on an emotional level. However the reason that she got into this business is also very difficult to connect with, due to changing her name and wanting to forget her past life through acting, the acting career is almost like she is still acting to be happy and content with life, however you can tell when she’s with Colin that she is not happy at all, she really struggles to show real emotion with most people. She’s a very difficult character to truly understand in depth through the film because it’s difficult to see what is in fact an act, and reality. In one part of the film with visiting the castle, she is swooned by a crowd of many fans and she simply says, “Shall I be her?” this suggests that the whole character and identity of Marilyn is an act too and she’s just putting on a brave face to hide the real emotion inside as she doesn’t wish people to portray her in that way. This means that engaging with the real Marilyn is near enough impossible as you can never clearly tell when your engaging with Marilyn the actress or simply the genuine Marilyn who she really is.
The real mental state of Marilyn is quite clearly disturbed and not clear at all, you can tell that she’s very troubled in the way that she acts and portrays herself. Due to this problem it’s very hard to get inside her head and really understand the thought process that she’s going through therefore making it difficult to engage with her and predict the sort of things she’s predicting and thinking of because there’s a kind of mental block and guard she has up.
Lastly Marilyn herself is older and a lot of mature in life by the sort of things that she’s done and achieved. In the film she is 30 years old and has already been married three times, and this gives her the sort of persona that she’s a very unsettled character and struggles with commitment, this could be due to her past relationships being abusive that she finds it difficult to trust people now and this once again links in with the thought process that she thinks everyone only likes her for who she is and not who she really is inside and because of this mentality that she has she feels like no one really understands her and who she is until Colin comes along and sees her for her. It’s almost as if she’s leading a double life and this makes it near enough impossible to engage with her on a good level.
Although it may be difficult to engage with Marilyn, in parts of the film it’s possible to share empathy with her, as you can tell that her emotions are real and not part of the double life that she’s leading, in the parts of the film where Marilyn is in company with Colin and she had an overdose, although she is under the influence of medication, you can tell that what she is saying is genuine and the real Marilyn is coming across to the audience.
I think that this was part of what the director wanted the film to be like, achieving the idea that underneath all of the limelight, fame and fortune that there is someone underneath all of that who has real emotion that can’t always show it to the audience as it would ruin their “image”. But towards the end of the film, you can see that Marilyn opens up more especially to Colin and therefore you can engage with her more, and you can share emotions with her.
However with Colin it’s much easier to connect with the character for a number of reasons, the first one being able to connect with him from the very beginning as he comes from a very normal background although his parents come from a wealthy background this is where it differs slightly but the style of how he was brought up and nurtured from a loving family is easily relatable, because of this it helps to engage with the character more as you can share a sense of empathy with them, because of being up properly and well-mannered I think this is part of the reason that Colin and Marilyn can interact with each other so well because everything that Marilyn ever wanted growing up she can see in Colin, and being the caring person that Colin is, he sees the true potential of who she could be and the fact that he is well and truly fascinated by her.
Instead of having his emotions bottled up and not shown because of his “image” Colin was very open and clear with his emotions, he wasn’t afraid to say what he was thinking and act on what he was thinking, because of this nature he was seen as kind and caring because of his actions towards the people surrounding him as he never held back.
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