Goodbye, Norma Jean

this is the worst movie i have ever seen. yes, i know that marilyn was raped but they make it so rediculous,like with a woman. i really dont think she would stoop so low.i have read up on her very much and there was no mention of that many rapes, or that close together. it seemed like everyday she got raped at least once. it is just heartbreaking to see a movie like that saying this is how it happened and it is the worst movie ever made

This movie is wrong in so many ways - MM did not start out as a blonde, as others have noted.

The only concession the producers made to period authenticity was the cars. No one has authentic 1940's hairdos or makeup. Check out the scene where everyone is leaving the screening room - they all look like they are in the 1970's which is when the movie was made. The main character's wig is a mess and looks like it has never been brushed.

And one character describes a "snuff" film as one where two women kill a guy - not what I usually hear a "snuff" film consists of.

The whole film is painful to watch as the production values are just terrible. Looks like the budget was about $500.

I remember Playboy magazine had a spread with Misty Rowe when this film was made. She recreated Marilyn Monroe's poses for the magazine and I wanted to see the movie because of it. I finally saw it on video. I wish I never did, it ranks as one of the worst films I ever saw. I mean total trash, no wonder it never got theatrical release.

The movie is a retelling of Marilyn Monroe's life, I think it may have been adapted from one of the books that Robert Slatzer's (SLEAZER) published about Miss Monroe. You know him, he's the guy who claimed to have been Marilyn's confidant and husband for about a weekend. All his claims were never proved as a matter of fact his marriage claim was totally disproven when a check dated at the same time of their wedding and signed by Miss Monroe proved that she was in Los Angeles at the time. Even if it weren't based on Slatzer's (SLEAZER) writing it's just plain garbage.

Source material aside it was the whole film was a mess. The editing looked jumpy, the acting terrible, the dialogue lame and it sounds as if everything the actors said reverberated on the wall. The film looked like it was shot with the wost film stock they can find. I think it may have been shot in 8MM, I mean it looked horrible. As for the casting, they casts "Hee Haw" Honey Misty Rowe as Marilyn. I mean I always thought Miss Rowe was a total babe but come on she absolutely look nothing like Marilyn Monroe. Then again Poppy Montgomery, Mira Sorvino, Asley Judd all played Marilyn and they look nothing like her. At least they can act.

Two things that really stuck in my mind is the theme song, a soft rock/folk rock tune that went "Norma Jean wants to be a movie queen" and the other thing is when she finally gets her big break she utters the immortal words "I never have to perform fellatio again", except in a more graphic term.

I remember bullying my then-boyfriend (now husband, in spite of my demonstrably bad taste in movies by wanting to even SEE this) to go see this in '76 when it first came out. He fought it, but being a guy, he finally agreed to humor me. About ten minutes into the movie, people started leaving -- it was THAT bad. I turned to him and said, "OK, you win. It stinks. Let's go." My punishment? We couldn't go -- we had to sit there and watch the WHOLE THING. Omigod, it must have been filmed by a blind man and edited a drunk and on crack. It was just an exploitively poor excuse for soft porn that happened to tack Marilyn Monroe's name on it. If I were her, I'd sue from the grave! When the final credits started to roll, he turned to me and said, "I'm sorry -- it was so bad that NO ONE should have had to sit through that." We still laugh about it, 30 years later, but it's definitely the top of the list as far as bad movies go!

The only thing this film got right was the fact that Norma Jeane disliked sex, a problem that most people who were molested and/or raped in childhood have in common. Although, such things can be overcome for short periods of time ... the person tends to slip back into their norm.

Misty Rowe ... what can I say about her performance that would not be cruel? Can't! Anyone taking on this role, as written in the script, had to be 100% STOOPID! The script turned Marilyn into a vulgar brainless twit, and no real fan of this Iconic Star would have accepted this role, as written! It amazes me that this trash is out on DVD, while Catherine Hicks' "Marilyn: The Untold Story" has never been released on DVD. The latter being thee best film on Marilyn ever created .... SO FAR! LadyShalene