Reviews
The Guardian
Peter Bradshaw
“It is a complete joy to see Branagh's Olivier erupt in queeny frustration at Marilyn's lateness, space-cadet vagueness, and preposterous Method acting indulgence ... However, in art as in life, Olivier's spotlight is taken away by Marilyn, played terrifically well by Williams: this is a figure she recreates, not by hamming up the pouty lips and breathiness, but the scared and brimming eyes, wide with unshed tears – terrified and angered by the thought of another explosion of temper from "Sir Olivier". ”
24/11/2011
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The Daily Mail
Chris Tookey
“It's an enchanting tragi-comedy, a hugely enjoyable trifle, and may prove an eye-opener to generations too young to remember the allure of Marilyn Monroe.”
25/11/2011
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Time Magazine
Mary Pols
“The rest of My Week with Marilyn is nothing more than a lively confection, but Williams locates a central truth, the contradictory allure of this utterly impossible woman — mercurial, vain, foolish, but also intelligent in some very primal way and achingly vulnerable. You like her, but you wouldn’t want to work with or for her.”
22/11/2011
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Total Film
Neil Smith
“Televisual in style and modest in scope, it occasionally looks as ill-suited to the big screen as its subject felt in the company of revered co-star Dame Sybil Thorndike or her playwright husband Arthur Miller. What it is, though, is witty, affecting and hugely entertaining.”
22/11/2011
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The Observer
Philip French
“Amusing but fanciful and ultimately lacks the ring of truth. The rest, as knowingly scripted by Adrian Hodges ... carries conviction. There is a real feeling for British cinema in its moderately prosperous, constantly crisis-dogged, ever-aspiring days in the 1950s.
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27/11/2011
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The Los Angeles Times
Betsy Sharkey
“It's hard to imagine a more unforgettable Monroe than the one Williams has given us — except for the original, of course.”
23/11/2011
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Empire Magazine
Angie Errigo
“At moments hilarious and others touching, it’s a sweet, slight affair, more pretty pageant than pithy biographical drama.”
21/11/2011
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The Evening Standard
David Sexton
“It amounts to no more than a big tease. ”
25/11/2011
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The Financial Times
Nigel Andrews
“[Clark's] alleged canoodlings with Monroe are a minor, apocryphal footnote: we keep wishing his character would go away, leaving the screen to Williams’s portrait of dippy pulchritude and to Branagh’s spectacularly funny Olivier. ”
25/11/2011
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Time Out
Dave Calhoun
“A minor movie about a minor episode in the life of a major star, but it has enough sense of its own high camp not to take itself too seriously. It’s pedestrian in most ways, but Williams – with a little help from friends in the lighting, camera, hair and make-up departments – lends it a touch of magic amid the nonsense.”
21/11/2011
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The New Yorker
David Denby
“Essentially preserves the point of view of an astonished boy. It’s an expertly made, intentionally minor movie, though when Monroe, doping herself with everything available, lies in bed, confused and hapless, there are depressing intimations of the end to come.”
28/11/2011
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The Sunday Times
Cosmo Landesman
“The Monroe story is so familiar, there’s little left to say: her sadness has been sucked dry. Consequently, the Marilyn we get here is the one we already know — beautiful, sexy, insecure, unprofessional, dependent on pills and her acting coach ... I hate to be a party-pooper, but Clark was either too much of a gentleman really to kiss and tell, or just too unlucky not actually to have sex with the world’s most famous sex symbol, so his story isn’t as fantastic as it seems.
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27/11/2011
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The Daily Telegraph
Robbie Collin
“Marilyn Monroe’s presence could render even the blandest film watchable, so it’s to Michelle Williams’ credit that her depiction of the actress, singer and incomparable sex symbol has exactly that effect on this otherwise fairly rheumy-jointed period piece.”
25/11/2011
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The New York Times
Manohla Dargis
“The film offers a catalog of Monroe stereotypes: child, woman, smiling exhibitionist, shrieking neurotic, the barefooted free spirit and, lamentably, the martyr teetering in heels toward her doom. The tragic Monroe is obviously dramatic, but the intimations of disaster don’t fit a movie that works so hard to be breezily, easily likable. ”
22/11/2011
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The Times
Kevin Maher
“It feels machine-tooled for awards juries and concocted solely for inspirational Marilyn-themed acceptance speeches. Which, as any actress will tell you, is a poor place to start.”
25/11/2011
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