Andrew Dominik Considered Re-Editing ‘Blonde’ After NC-17 Rating

The NC-17 rating of Blonde, the Marilyn Monroe biopic that’s in theaters now and on Netflix next week, has been an understandable source of fascination in the entertainment industry over the last several months. It’s the most strict rating the Motion Picture Association has to offer, and bars anyone under 17 from entering the theater, whether or not they are accompanied by a willing adult. (Minors are allowed to see R-rated movies if they have a parent or guardian with them.) For films that rely on a theatrical box office, NC-17 is a commercial killer.

In a recent interview with Decider, Blonde director Andrew Dominik said he was surprised by the rating, which came from “some sexual content” according to the MPA, and considered re-editing the film to try for an R-rating.

“If I could have cut it back without hurting the movie, I would have done it, but I couldn’t,” Dominik told Decider. “If I could have done it without making the movie bad, I would have.”

He added that he wasn’t given much insight into the reason for the rating. “The ratings board is a lock box. They don’t tell you why they give you what they do,” he said. “They sort of give you hints as to how you could make your film more palatable to them, but it feels like a moving target.”

Before Blonde, the last movie the MPA hit with an NC-17 rating was a 2018 documentary, This One’s For The Ladies: Uncensored, about male strippers that featured a lot of full-frontal nudity and close-ups of penises. By contrast, Blonde rarely goes below the belt and obscures its sex scenes with blurred images and metaphorical waterfalls. Star Ana de Armas previously stated that she “didn’t understand” the reason for the rating, telling the French publication L’Officiel, “I can tell you a number of shows or movies that are way more explicit with a lot more sexual content than Blonde.”

Dominik agrees with that sentiment, telling Decider, “I didn’t want to make an NC-17 movie. And I actually felt that we colored between the lines. But I think we exist in a time now where nobody’s really sure what the boundaries are. What’s cancelable and what’s not? It seems like people are very scared of being criticized, particularly when it comes to depictions of women. I think they probably just erred on the side of caution.”

The much-talked-about rape scene, which is a prominent moment in the Joyce Carol Oates novel Blonde is adapted from, is brief, and without much shown on screen. “The way we handle [the rape scene] is we just kind of waterski over it,” Dominik said. More graphic are the depictions of Marilyn’s miscarriages and forced abortion, which includes a brief shot from the point-of-view of her cervix. And much of the last hour of the film features de Armas topless.

While disappointed, Dominik said he is not worried about how the NC-17 rating will affect Blonde‘s financial success. “It’s a Netflix movie,” he said. “It’s not like it’s depending on its theatrical life. There’s an advantage from being on Netflix—that kind of stuff doesn’t apply.”