Marilyn Monroe at 100 explored in new short film

Marilyn Monroe would have turned 100 on June 1. How would she have aged? How long would she have continued working? Would she still have worn the short, layered platinum-blonde hairstyle that later became known as the “Marilyn bob”? Would she still have used black eyeliner to emphasize her famous, slightly myopic gaze?

The immortal icon remains forever frozen at the age of 36, when she died on August 4, 1962, remembered for her extraordinary beauty and what Billy Wilder described as her “Flesh Impact” — her physical presence, the sensation that she could almost be touched, and ultimately the sensuality that became one of the reasons for her success, CE Report quotes ANSA.

Few figures have been examined and analyzed as extensively as Monroe, both during her lifetime and especially after her death. But is there anything left that we still do not know about her?

Maggie Gyllenhaal, who is serving as jury president at this year’s Venice Film Festival, attempts to portray Monroe from a different perspective on the centenary of her birth.

The 21-minute short film, “Flesh Impact,” received its world premiere in Venice during the presentation of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement to Ellen Burstyn, who portrays one version of Marilyn in the film. Dakota Johnson plays another.

The cast also includes Peter Sarsgaard and Sepideh Moafi, who was recently nominated for an Emmy for “The Pitt.”

The story begins with an elegant elderly woman stepping out of an electric car on a street in central New York and walking into a theater to audition for the role of socialite Carol Cutrere in Tennessee Williams’ 1957 play “Orpheus Descending.”

She arrives an hour late — as Marilyn famously often did — but the casting director points out that there is another problem: “Carol is 25.”

From there begins Marilyn’s first-person journey back through her life — a woman who was adored, exploited, idolized and ultimately destroyed.

She recalls that, in order to receive job offers, she once had to walk boldly around the studio in a slip so that people would notice her and unleash the “Flesh Impact” referenced in the title.

Dakota Johnson appears as the younger Marilyn — beautiful, at the height of her career but also at the peak of her vulnerability. However, Gyllenhaal’s delicate and deeply melancholic portrait focuses primarily on Burstyn’s elderly Marilyn.

The film concludes unexpectedly with a serenade to Marilyn Monroe performed in the unmistakable voice of Patti Smith.

Before delivering her audition monologue, the character looks back on her career, bringing her pain to the surface in what resembles a spoken meditation. She recalls the hurt of seeing her hometown honor Jane Russell but not her, the stigma surrounding actresses, who were regarded as prostitutes, and the compromises she was forced to make.

It is a portrait of a wounded Marilyn, but also one who is fully aware of what she considers her superpower: femininity.

Photo: Instagram\mgyllenhaal